Don't Restart the Agent: Fork from Any Earlier Turn with VS Code 1.128's Parallel Claude Chats

TL;DR: VS Code 1.128 (July 8) lets you run multiple Claude agent chats in parallel inside one session — fork from any earlier turn to compare approaches, run tasks concurrently, and pick the winner without losing either history.

Before 1.128, if you wanted to try two implementation approaches in a Claude agent session, you either committed to one or started a second session from scratch and lost the shared context. Multi-chat in 1.128 fixes this: a session can contain peer chats grouped together, each with its own turn history, model selection, and title — without bleeding context between them.

Three workflows this enables

Branch-and-compare. You reach a fork — "use a class or functional approach?" — and click fork from that turn. Each branch runs its own conversation. Compare both to completion, pick the winner. Neither is lost.

Parallel independent tasks. Add peer chats to the same session and send turns concurrently. All run simultaneously with no context bleeding between chats.

Monitor a subagent without interrupting it. Watch a subagent's progress in one read-only chat while your main conversation continues. No need to pause the agent to check what it's doing.

How to fork

In the Agents window, right-click any message → "Fork from this turn." The new peer chat appears in the same session group and inherits context from the parent up to that point.

Copilot Vision is also GA in 1.128

Microsoft removed the admin policy gate for Copilot Vision — free-tier VS Code users can now paste, drag, or drop images and PDFs into chat without an IT ticket. Useful for sharing a failing test screenshot or a wireframe to implement.

Sources: VS Code 1.128 Release Notes · Claude AI boost in VS Code 1.128 — Visual Studio Magazine