Uploaded March 2026 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
Boris Cherny is the creator and Head of Claude Code at Anthropic. He previously spent five years at Meta as a Principal Engineer and is the author of the book Programming TypeScript.
In this episode of Pragmatic Engineer, we went through how Claude Code was built and what it means when engineers no longer write most of the code themselves.
We discuss how Claude Code evolved from a side project into a core internal tool at Anthropic and how Boris uses it day-to-day. We go deep into workflow details, including parallel agents, PR structure, deterministic review patterns, and how the system retrieves context from large codebases. We also get into how Claude Cowork was built.
As coding becomes more accessible, the role of engineers shifts rather than shrinks. We examine what that shift means in practice, which skills become more important, and why the lines between product, engineering, and design are blurring.
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*Brought to you by our season partners:*
• Statsig — The unified platform for flags, analytics, experiments, and more. statsig.com/pragmatic
• Sonar – The makers of SonarQube, the industry standard for automated code review. https://www.sonarsource.com/pragmatic/?utm_medium=paid&utm_source=pragmaticengineer&ut[…]egory=Paid&s_source=Paid%20Other&s_origin=pragmaticengineer
• WorkOS – Everything you need to make your app enterprise ready. workos.com
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*The Pragmatic Engineer deepdives relevant for this episode:*
• How Claude Code is built newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/how-claude-code-is-built
• How Anthropic built Artifacts newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/how-anthropic-built-artifacts
• How Codex is built newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/how-codex-is-built
• Real-world engineering challenges: building Cursor newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/cursor
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*Where to find Boris Cherny:*
• X: https://x.com/bcherny
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/bcherny
• Website: borischerny.com
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*In this episode, we cover:*
(00:00) Intro
(11:15) Lessons from Meta
(19:46) Joining Anthropic
(23:08) The origins of Claude Code
(32:55) Boris's Claude Code workflow
(36:27) Parallel agents
(40:25) Code reviews
(47:18) Claude Code's architecture
(52:38) Permissions and sandboxing
(55:05) Engineering culture at Anthropic
(1:05:15) Claude Cowork
(1:12:48) Observability and privacy
(1:14:45) Agent swarms
(1:21:16) LLMs and the printing press analogy
(1:30:16) Standout engineer archetypes
(1:32:12) What skills still matter for engineers
(1:35:24) Book recommendations
—
See the transcript and other references from the episode at newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/podcast
—
Production and marketing by penname.co/.
Boris Cherny is the creator and Head of Claude Code at Anthropic. He previously spent five years at Meta as a Principal Engineer and is the author of the book Programming TypeScript.
In this episode of Pragmatic Engineer, we went through how Claude Code was built and what it means when engineers no longer write most of the code themselves.
We discuss how Claude Code evolved from a side project into a core internal tool at Anthropic and how Boris uses it day-to-day. We go deep into workflow details, including parallel agents, PR structure, deterministic review patterns, and how the system retrieves context from large codebases. We also get into how Claude Cowork was built.
As coding becomes more accessible, the role of engineers shifts rather than shrinks. We examine what that shift means in practice, which skills become more important, and why the lines between product, engineering, and design are blurring.
—
*Brought to you by our season partners:*
• Statsig — The unified platform for flags, analytics, experiments, and more. statsig.com/pragmatic
• Sonar – The makers of SonarQube, the industry standard for automated code review. https://www.sonarsource.com/pragmatic/?utm_medium=paid&utm_source=pragmaticengineer&ut[…]egory=Paid&s_source=Paid%20Other&s_origin=pragmaticengineer
• WorkOS – Everything you need to make your app enterprise ready. workos.com
—
*The Pragmatic Engineer deepdives relevant for this episode:*
• How Claude Code is built newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/how-claude-code-is-built
• How Anthropic built Artifacts newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/how-anthropic-built-artifacts
• How Codex is built newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/how-codex-is-built
• Real-world engineering challenges: building Cursor newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/p/cursor
—
*Where to find Boris Cherny:*
• X: https://x.com/bcherny
• LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/bcherny
• Website: borischerny.com
—
*In this episode, we cover:*
(00:00) Intro
(11:15) Lessons from Meta
(19:46) Joining Anthropic
(23:08) The origins of Claude Code
(32:55) Boris's Claude Code workflow
(36:27) Parallel agents
(40:25) Code reviews
(47:18) Claude Code's architecture
(52:38) Permissions and sandboxing
(55:05) Engineering culture at Anthropic
(1:05:15) Claude Cowork
(1:12:48) Observability and privacy
(1:14:45) Agent swarms
(1:21:16) LLMs and the printing press analogy
(1:30:16) Standout engineer archetypes
(1:32:12) What skills still matter for engineers
(1:35:24) Book recommendations
—
See the transcript and other references from the episode at newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com/podcast
—
Production and marketing by penname.co/.
