Claude Code in JetBrains IDEs

Claude Code runs in JetBrains IDEs through an official plugin. One plugin covers IntelliJ IDEA, PyCharm, WebStorm, GoLand, PhpStorm, RubyMine, Rider, CLion, DataGrip, and Android Studio — install once, works everywhere. The plugin shares its configuration with the Claude Code CLI, so the same CLAUDE.md, hooks, MCP servers, and permission rules apply whether you're working in the JetBrains UI or the terminal.

This article covers installation, the JetBrains-specific behaviours that differ from the VS Code extension, and the issues that catch people on first setup.

Installation

You need two things on your machine: the Claude Code CLI installed and authenticated, and the plugin from JetBrains Marketplace.

Install Claude Code from the terminal first — brew install --cask claude-code on macOS, or follow the official installer for your platform. Run claude /login and authenticate against your plan or set ANTHROPIC_API_KEY if you want API billing
Open your JetBrains IDE. Go to Settings → Plugins → Marketplace, search for "Claude Code", and install. The plugin requires the IDE itself to be on a recent build (2024.2 or later for most IDEs)
Restart the IDE. A Claude Code panel appears in the side gutter; click to open

The plugin shells out to the claude binary it finds on your $PATH. If the IDE can't find it — most often because IDEs launched from the macOS Dock don't inherit your shell's PATH — open Settings → Tools → Claude Code and set the absolute path to the binary (find it with which claude in a terminal).

What's the same as VS Code

Same configuration files — .claude/CLAUDE.md, rules, settings, skills, commands, agents
Same MCP servers — registered globally in ~/.claude.json or per-workspace in .mcp.json; both visible to the JetBrains plugin and the CLI
Same auth — log in via the CLI once, the IDE picks up the same session
Selection-aware context — highlight code in the editor, ask Claude about it, and your selection is included automatically
Diff viewing — when Claude proposes file changes, you see them in JetBrains' native diff viewer with the option to accept, reject, or modify
File reference shortcut — Cmd+Option+K on macOS, Alt+Ctrl+K on Windows/Linux, drops a reference to the current file into the chat
Diagnostic awareness — Claude can read the IDE's lint and inspection results from the language server, useful for "fix the warnings on this file" tasks

What differs from VS Code

The JetBrains plugin trails the VS Code extension in feature breadth. Things that are present in VS Code but currently absent or partial in JetBrains as of early 2026:

Permission mode UI — switching between default, acceptEdits, plan, and the others is less prominent in the JetBrains UI; you may need to set the mode via settings.json or invoke it from the chat input
Slash command palette — VS Code surfaces slash commands in a UI menu; in JetBrains you usually type them directly
Checkpoint and rewind — the visual session checkpoint navigation in VS Code is not yet matched in JetBrains
Plan mode visualisation — when Claude is in plan mode, VS Code shows a dedicated approval UI; JetBrains shows the plan as text in the chat

None of these are dealbreakers — the underlying capabilities all work, you just access them differently. If you live mostly in JetBrains for a particular language and only occasionally use Claude Code's more advanced modes, the plugin is fully serviceable. If you spend most of your day in plan mode and rely on the visual approval flow, VS Code is currently the more polished surface.

Config storage

The plugin uses ~/.claude/ as its home — same directory as the CLI. There is no separate "JetBrains Claude config". Settings, MCP registrations, auth tokens, and conversation JSONL files are shared between the IDE and the CLI on the same machine. Open the same workspace in both at once and they see the same state.

The plugin does have its own IDE-level settings, accessed via Settings → Tools → Claude Code — things like the path to the claude binary, keyboard behaviour, and panel layout. These live in the JetBrains config directory (under ~/Library/Application Support/JetBrains/ on macOS) and are independent of ~/.claude/.

Common installation issues

"Claude binary not found". The IDE can't locate claude on its PATH. Find the path with which claude in a terminal, then set it explicitly in Settings → Tools → Claude Code → Claude command. Use the full absolute path
Plugin opens but never connects. Usually means the CLI hasn't been authenticated yet. Run claude /login in a terminal, complete the flow, then reopen the panel
MCP servers don't appear. Check that the path in your MCP config is absolute. The plugin launches MCP server commands from the workspace root, but if your config used a relative path that worked from your shell's working directory, it won't resolve from the IDE
Remote development mode. If you're using JetBrains Gateway or Remote Development, the Claude Code plugin must be installed on the remote host, not on the local client. Install it from the remote IDE's Settings → Plugins, not from the Gateway window
WSL2 on Windows. If your project lives in WSL but the IDE runs on the Windows host, Claude Code needs to be installed in WSL and the IDE configured to launch it via wsl claude. Set the command path accordingly in plugin settings
ESC doesn't interrupt. Sometimes ESC inside the chat input doesn't cancel a running response because of a JetBrains terminal binding. Settings → Tools → Terminal → "Move focus to editor with Escape" needs to be off for ESC to reach the Claude panel

When to use which

If you already work primarily in a JetBrains IDE for a strongly-typed language with deep IDE integration — Java, Kotlin, Go, Ruby, C# — the plugin lets you stay where the language tooling is best. If you split time between languages, or you rely on plan-mode flows and visual checkpoints heavily, VS Code is still the more featureful surface for Claude Code today. The CLI works the same in both, so you can always drop into the terminal for anything the plugin doesn't expose yet.