clipwarp

Paste screenshots into Claude Code on Windows.

Copy an image anywhere → press Ctrl+V in Claude Code → it attaches. A tiny, local PowerShell utility. No admin, no dependencies.

The problem

On native Windows, Claude Code can't read an image from the clipboard. Ctrl+V and Alt+V silently do nothing after you snip with Snipping Tool (Win+Shift+S), Lightshot, ShareX, or "Copy image" in a browser — a long-standing issue reported across anthropics/claude-code#22068, #26679, and #32791 (the latter two still open; Alt+V only works under WSL).

What always works is a file path pasted as text — Claude Code auto-attaches any .png / .jpg / .gif / .webp path it sees. clipwarp turns whatever image is on your clipboard into exactly that, automatically:

┌─────────────┐     ┌──────────────────────────────┐     ┌────────────────────┐
│  Win+Shift+S │ ──▶ │  clipwarp: save clipboard    │ ──▶ │  Ctrl+V in Claude  │
│  / Ctrl+C    │     │  image → PNG, put its path   │     │  Code = image      │
│  anywhere    │     │  on the clipboard as text    │     │  attached ✓        │
└─────────────┘     └──────────────────────────────┘     └────────────────────┘

Install

One command in PowerShell:

irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/botnick/clipwarp/main/install.ps1 | iex

_{Or from a clone: git clone https://github.com/botnick/clipwarp; .\clipwarp\install.ps1}

The installer copies the scripts to %USERPROFILE%\.claude\scripts and registers a clipwarp command (plus a short cw alias) in the all-hosts profile of both PowerShell editions — Windows PowerShell 5.1 and PowerShell 7 — so it works whichever one you open. Idempotent; re-run any time to update. Open a new terminal afterwards (or run . $PROFILE) so the command is found.

No admin rights, no services, no dependencies — plain PowerShell and .NET classes that ship with Windows. Everything runs locally; images never leave your machine.

Quick start

Automatic (recommended) — plain Ctrl+C → Ctrl+V

clipwarp watch       # start the background clipboard watcher, once
clipwarp autostart   # optional: also start it at every login

While the watcher runs, every image that lands on the clipboard is converted automatically — snip, Lightshot, browser "Copy image", Ctrl+C on an image file. Just Ctrl+V in Claude Code and the image attaches.

The clipboard is rewritten as dual format, so nothing else breaks:

Copies that carry meaningful text alongside an image (e.g. a paragraph from Word) are left untouched — only pure image copies convert.

clipwarp status       # is the watcher running? is autostart on?
clipwarp stop         # stop it
clipwarp unautostart  # remove the login autostart

[!IMPORTANT] Turn the watcher off when you're not using Claude Code. While clipwarp watch is running, every copied image also carries its file path as text. Apps that accept images still paste the image — but a plain text box will receive the path instead (e.g. C:\Users\you\.claude\pasted-images\clip-….png). When you're done, run clipwarp stop (and clipwarp unautostart so it doesn't launch at next login).

Manual — one command per paste

1. Snip or copy any image (Win+Shift+S, Lightshot, ShareX, a browser…).
2. Run cw (short for clipwarp).
3. Switch to Claude Code and press Ctrl+V. Done.

Commands

Supported clipboard formats

clipwarp reads the clipboard in whatever format the source app actually used — this is what makes it work where a naive Get-Clipboard -Format Image fails:

.bmp sources are transcoded to PNG (Claude Code doesn't attach .bmp). Clipboard access is retried through transient locks; in watcher mode the write is guarded by the clipboard sequence number, so a slow conversion never overwrites a newer copy.

Privacy & housekeeping

• 100% local. The image is written to %USERPROFILE%\.claude\pasted-images and only its path is put on your clipboard. Nothing touches the network.
• Auto-cleanup. Saved images older than 7 days are deleted automatically, so the folder never grows unbounded and won't clutter your machine.

Scripting

clipwarp prints the saved path, so it composes:

$img = clipwarp -Quiet   # -> C:\Users\you\.claude\pasted-images\clip-....png

FAQ

Requirements

• Windows 10 / 11
• Windows PowerShell 5.1 (preinstalled) or PowerShell 7 — both supported and both registered by the installer (clipboard access is marshalled onto an STA thread internally)
• Claude Code running in any native Windows terminal

Uninstall

# Works after any install (the installer copies the uninstaller here):
& "$HOME\.claude\scripts\uninstall.ps1"
& "$HOME\.claude\scripts\uninstall.ps1" -PurgeImages   # also delete saved images

# Or, from the git clone you installed from:
.\clipwarp\uninstall.ps1

The uninstaller stops the watcher, removes its login-autostart shortcut, deletes the installed scripts, and strips the clipwarp function from both PowerShell editions.

Contributing

Issues and PRs welcome — especially reports of clipboard formats from apps that still fail (attach the output of clipwarp without -Quiet).

License

MIT