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Boris Cherny

Creator and head of Claude Code, Anthropic

Sources checked on 12 November 2026

AI coding agentsDeveloper toolsTypeScript

Who is Boris Cherny

Boris Cherny is the creator and head of Claude Code, Anthropic's agentic coding tool[1][3][13]. He built the first version as a small prototype soon after he joined Anthropic in 2024[1][12]. His own site describes him as a software engineer at Anthropic, where he created Claude Code, and says he is based in San Francisco[2].

Anthropic runs a series called "Office Hours with Boris Cherny" and describes him there as the person who created Claude Code[21]. In November 2026 he commented in a Hacker News thread about the tool's "Don't Ask Again" setting. He wrote: "We built an open source agent-agnostic sandbox that we are landing improvements to, much more to come"[5].

Profile of Anthropic co-founder and president Daniela Amodei

Before Anthropic

Cherny was born in Ukraine and emigrated to the United States in 1995[10][11]. He studied economics and left university to start companies, and he has no computer science degree[6]. He started his first company at 18 and later worked at a hedge fund, where a coworker introduced him to Scala and functional programming[6].

At Meta he started on Chats in Groups, a project to bring Messenger and Facebook closer together, and built Undux, a React state library, as a side project[6]. He became tech lead for Facebook Groups[8]. He rose to Senior Staff engineer (IC7) and was nominated for Principal (IC8) shortly before he left[6]. The Pragmatic Engineer says he spent five years at Meta, and that at Instagram he led migrations from Python to the Facebook monolith and from REST to GraphQL[7].

In December 2023 he wrote that he had spent the previous year and a half working for Instagram from Nara, Japan, on Instagram Maps, QR codes and Python tech debt[8]. He told developing.dev that using ChatGPT in Japan convinced him to work on large language models[6].

He wrote Programming TypeScript, published by O'Reilly in 2019[22]. In a May 2019 post he wrote that the book took 15 months, against his estimate of 8 months[9].

Creating Claude Code

Cherny joined Anthropic in 2024[1]. At a Computer History Museum event in September 2026 he explained why: "The model was ready and no one on the product side was realizing it"[1].

Within a month of joining, he built a small command-line prototype that used the Claude API to write and change code[12]. He shared it with his team, people used it every day, and it spread inside Anthropic without a launch plan[12].

Anthropic released Claude Code as a limited research preview on 24 February 2025, alongside Claude 3.7 Sonnet, and called it its first agentic coding tool[13]. Claude Code became generally available on 22 May 2025 with Claude 4[14]. Anthropic released beta extensions for VS Code and JetBrains and a Claude Code SDK at the same time[14].

On 12 February 2026 Anthropic said Claude Code's run-rate revenue had grown to over $2.5 billion[15]. In the same post it cited a SemiAnalysis estimate that Claude Code authored 4% of all public GitHub commits[15].

The move to Cursor and back

In July 2025 The Information reported that Cherny had joined Anysphere, the maker of Cursor, as chief architect and head of engineering[16]. Cat Wu, who had been the product manager for Claude Code, joined Anysphere as head of product[16].

About two weeks later The Information reported that Anthropic had hired both of them back[17][18]. The Computer History Museum still described him as head of Claude Code at Anthropic in September 2026[1].

Profile of Cursor co-founder Aman Sanger

How he uses Claude Code

In a January 2026 thread on X, Cherny wrote: "I run 5 Claudes in parallel in my terminal"[19][23]. In the same thread he said he runs another 5 to 10 Claude sessions on claude.ai[19][23].

He told The Pragmatic Engineer that each parallel instance works in its own checkout of the code, and that he starts in plan mode[7]. "Once there is a good plan, it will one-shot the implementation almost every time," he said[7]. He also said he ships 20 to 30 pull requests a day[7].

At Fortune Brainstorm Tech in June 2026 he said: "I haven't written a line of code by hand in, I think, eight months now"[3]. He described Claude Code itself as "100% written by Claude Code"[3]. At the same conference he said that on some days he manages "thousands, or tens of thousands" of AI agents, and that "it's actually another Claude that does the prompting"[4].

The site howborisusesclaudecode.com collects tips from his public X posts, but it is a fan-made site that says it is not affiliated with Anthropic[20].

Known for

Frequently asked questions

Who created Claude Code?

Boris Cherny created Claude Code. He built it as a small command-line prototype within a month of joining Anthropic in 2024, and it spread inside the company before Anthropic released it.

What does Boris Cherny do at Anthropic?

He is the head of Claude Code, Anthropic's agentic coding tool. Anthropic released Claude Code as a research preview on 24 February 2025 and made it generally available on 22 May 2025.

Did Boris Cherny leave Anthropic for Cursor?

Briefly. In July 2025 The Information reported that he had joined Anysphere, the maker of Cursor, as chief architect and head of engineering. About two weeks later it reported that Anthropic had hired him back.

What book did Boris Cherny write?

He wrote Programming TypeScript, published by O'Reilly in 2019. He wrote that the book took him 15 months.

How does Boris Cherny use Claude Code?

He runs five Claude sessions in parallel in his terminal, each in its own checkout, and 5 to 10 more on claude.ai. He starts in plan mode, and he said in June 2026 that he had not written code by hand for about eight months.

Where did Boris Cherny work before Anthropic?

He worked at Meta, where he was tech lead for Facebook Groups and later worked for Instagram from Nara, Japan. Before Meta he started companies and worked at a hedge fund.

Sources

  1. Computer History Museum: In conversation with Boris Cherny, creator of Claude Code, September 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  2. Boris Cherny's website: About — checked 12 Nov 2026
  3. Fortune: Boris Cherny doesn't write code by hand anymore, 11 June 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  4. Fortune: Boris Cherny says some days he manages tens of thousands of AI agents, 8 June 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  5. Hacker News: thread on Claude Code's "Don't Ask Again" setting, with comments by bcherny, November 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  6. developing.dev: Boris Cherny, creator of Claude Code, December 2025 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  7. The Pragmatic Engineer: Building Claude Code with Boris Cherny, March 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  8. Boris Cherny: Working remotely, December 2023 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  9. Boris Cherny: Tips for writing a technical book, May 2019 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  10. dev.ua: Claude Code creator Boris Cherny says he was born in Ukraine and emigrated to the US in 1995 (in Ukrainian) — checked 12 Nov 2026
  11. DOU: Boris Cherny is from Ukraine (in Ukrainian) — checked 12 Nov 2026
  12. Station F: Boris Cherny, March 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  13. Anthropic: Claude 3.7 Sonnet and Claude Code, February 2025 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  14. Anthropic: Introducing Claude 4, May 2025 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  15. Anthropic: Series G funding at a $380 billion valuation, February 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  16. Investing.com: Anysphere hires Anthropic's Claude Code leaders, citing The Information, July 2025 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  17. The Information: Anthropic hires back two coding AI leaders from Cursor developer Anysphere, July 2025 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  18. Lenny's Newsletter: Head of Claude Code, what happens after coding is solved, February 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  19. Boris Cherny on X: how he uses Claude Code, January 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  20. How Boris Uses Claude Code (fan-made site, not affiliated with Anthropic) — checked 12 Nov 2026
  21. Claude: Office Hours with Boris Cherny — checked 12 Nov 2026
  22. I Programmer: Programming TypeScript (O'Reilly), June 2019 — checked 12 Nov 2026
  23. VentureBeat: The creator of Claude Code just revealed his workflow, January 2026 — checked 12 Nov 2026
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