Fixing Common Frustrations: Why Claude Code Isn't Wrapping Text in Your IDE
Z
Zack Saadioui
8/11/2025
Of course, here is the ~3000 word blog post based on the research and plan.
Fixing Common Frustrations: Why Claude Code Isn't Wrapping Text in Your IDE
Alright, let's talk about something that has probably driven you nuts at least once. You’re in the zone, working with Claude, & it generates a beautiful, complex piece of code. Maybe it's a long list of dictionary items, a chunk of HTML, or a function with a bunch of parameters. You copy it, flip over to your IDE like VS Code or a Jupyter Notebook, paste it in, &... your heart sinks.
It's one. single. massive. line.
You now have to scroll horizontally for what feels like a mile to read it. Your code linter is probably screaming at you, & your carefully organized workspace now looks like a mess. It completely breaks your flow. Honestly, it's one of those small things that can be disproportionately frustrating when you're just trying to get work done.
So what gives? Is Claude just bad at formatting? Is it trying to annoy you on purpose?
Turns out, the answer is a bit more nuanced & the fix is often surprisingly simple. The good news is, you're not doing anything wrong, & this is a super common hiccup. This guide is here to be your friendly expert, to walk you through why this happens & give you the concrete, step-by-step solutions to fix it for good in your favorite coding environment. We'll get this sorted out so you can get back to what matters: building cool stuff.
The Real Reason Your Code Isn't Wrapping
Here's the thing that might surprise you: this isn't really Claude's fault. It's more of a misunderstanding between how an AI generates text & how your specific code editor is set up to display it.
AI Models Think in Strings, Not in Formatted Layouts
At its core, a large language model like Claude is a text-generation engine. It creates a long, continuous string of characters. When we see nicely formatted code, we see lines, indents, & structure. The AI sees a sequence of tokens that includes characters, spaces, & special "newline" characters (
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\n
).
Often, when generating code that is syntactically correct, the model might not add those "cosmetic" newlines that a human developer would naturally use to keep lines at a reasonable length. For example, a Python list
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[1, 2, 3, 4, ... 100]
is perfectly valid code as a single line. A human would break it up for readability, but an AI might not unless you specifically ask it to. The code works, so its job is technically done.
The real culprit here is that the primary responsibility for how text is displayed—including whether it wraps to the next line—lies with your Integrated Development Environment (IDE) or text editor. Your IDE has a setting that tells it: "When you encounter a line of text that's longer than the visible width of the window, should you extend the window with a horizontal scrollbar or should you 'soft wrap' it onto the next line for display?"
By default, many editors have this "soft wrap" feature turned off, assuming you want to see the "raw" line structure of the file.
The Copy-Paste Problem
Another subtle factor can be the act of copying & pasting itself. When you highlight text in a web browser (like the Claude.ai chat interface), you're not just copying raw text; you're copying a slice of the webpage's rendered HTML. Depending on your browser & operating system, this can sometimes lead to a loss of formatting when you paste it into a plain text environment like a code editor.
This is why using dedicated tools, which we'll touch on later, can provide a much smoother experience. They communicate with the model more directly & bypass the whole browser copy-paste dance.
So, to sum it up: Claude provides the raw string of code, & your IDE is what decides how to show it to you. The frustration you're feeling is almost always just a simple settings mismatch. Let's fix it.
The Ultimate Guide to Fixing Text Wrapping in Your IDE
This is the meat & potatoes of it. We’ll go through the most common environments one by one & get this problem solved permanently.
Visual Studio Code (VS Code): Your New Best Friend
VS Code is probably the most popular editor for developers these days, so let's start here. You have two main ways to solve the wrapping problem.
The Quick Fix: The Magic Shortcut
If you're in a hurry & just want to fix the one file you're looking at, there's a keyboard shortcut for that.
On Windows & Linux:
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Alt + Z
On Mac:
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Option + Z
Pressing this will instantly toggle word wrapping for the active editor pane. The long line will immediately wrap to fit your window. Press it again, & it will un-wrap. This is great for a one-off fix, but it's temporary. If you close the file & reopen it, or open a new file, it'll go back to the default behavior.
The Permanent Fix: Set It & Forget It
Honestly, for an AI-assisted workflow where you're frequently pasting in generated code, you want word wrap on by default. Here’s how to make that happen.
Open Settings: You can do this by clicking the gear icon in the bottom-left corner & selecting "Settings," or by using the shortcut
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Ctrl + ,
(Windows/Linux) or
1
Cmd + ,
(Mac).
Search for "Word Wrap": In the search bar at the top of the Settings UI, just type
1
word wrap
.
Find the
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Editor: Word Wrap
Setting: This is the main setting you need. It will have a dropdown menu with a few options.
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off
: This is usually the default. Lines will not wrap, & you'll get that dreaded horizontal scrollbar.
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on
: This is what you probably want. Lines will wrap at the edge of your editor window. If you resize the window, the text will reflow automatically. This is PERFECT for most use cases.
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wordWrapColumn
: This will wrap lines at a specific character column number, which you define in another setting (
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editor.wordWrapColumn
). Useful if you have strict line-length rules.
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bounded
: This is a combination of
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on
&
1
wordWrapColumn
. It will wrap at whichever is smaller: the viewport width or the specified column number.
Select "on" from the dropdown. That's it! The settings save automatically. Now, any file you open, & any code you paste, will wrap beautifully within the window.
For the folks who prefer editing the raw JSON file, you can open your