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Overview

The /clear command clears the current conversation history, frees up context space, and starts a fresh session. This is useful when you want to begin a new topic or when your conversation history becomes too long.

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Usage

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In Interactive Mode

qwen
> /clear

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Alternative Names

The following aliases are available:
  • /clear
  • /reset
  • /new

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What It Does

When you run /clear, the command:
  1. Clears Terminal: Removes all messages from the display
  2. Resets Chat History: Clears the conversation context sent to the AI
  3. Starts New Session: Generates a new session ID
  4. Resets Metrics: Clears token usage and statistics
  5. Preserves Settings: Keeps your authentication and configuration

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When to Use

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Starting a New Topic

Clear when switching to an unrelated topic: 
qwen
> Help me debug this authentication issue
...
> /clear
> Now let's work on the UI components

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Context Window Full

If you’re approaching token limits: 
> /clear
Consider using /compress instead if you want to preserve some context while reducing token usage.

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Privacy Concerns

Clear sensitive information from context: 
> /clear

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Fresh Start

After completing a task: 
> /clear

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Behavior Details

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What Gets Cleared

  • ✅ Conversation messages
  • ✅ Terminal display
  • ✅ Chat history context
  • ✅ Token usage metrics
  • ✅ Session statistics

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What Gets Preserved

  • ✅ Authentication credentials
  • ✅ Model selection
  • ✅ Configuration settings
  • ✅ Custom themes
  • ✅ Extension settings

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Session IDs

Each /clear generates a new session ID: 
> /stats
Session ID: abc123-def456

> /clear
Starting a new session, resetting chat, and clearing terminal.

> /stats
Session ID: ghi789-jkl012

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Clear vs Compress

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Use /clear when:

  • Starting a completely new topic
  • Conversation is too long and unrelated
  • You want a fresh start
  • Clearing sensitive data

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Use /compress when:

  • Continuing the same topic
  • Preserving important context
  • Optimizing token usage
  • Maintaining conversation flow
# Complete reset
qwen
> Help me with authentication
...
> /clear  # Start fresh
> Now help me with the database

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Command Output

After running /clear: 
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Starting a new session, resetting chat, and clearing terminal.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Qwen Code - Type your message or /help for commands

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Resuming Cleared Sessions

Cleared sessions are still saved and can be resumed: 
# Clear current session
> /clear

# Later, resume the previous session
qwen --resume <previous-session-id>
View available sessions: 
qwen --resume
This opens a session picker where you can select any previous session, including cleared ones.

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Automation Examples

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Clear After Each Task

#!/bin/bash
# Script to run multiple independent tasks

qwen --prompt "Task 1: Generate API docs"
qwen --prompt "Task 2: Write unit tests" # New session automatically
qwen --prompt "Task 3: Update README"     # Another new session
Each invocation starts a fresh session automatically in headless mode.

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Conditional Clear

qwen
> Help me with this long task
...
# After 50 messages
> /compress  # Try compression first
...
# If still having issues
> /clear     # Start fresh if needed

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Chat Recording

By default, cleared sessions are saved to disk. To disable recording: 
qwen --chat-recording=false
With recording disabled:
  • No session history is saved
  • Cannot resume sessions
  • /clear still works but nothing is stored

/compress

Compress context while preserving information

/stats

View session statistics before clearing

--resume

Resume a previous session

--session-id

Use a custom session identifier

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Troubleshooting

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Clear Not Working

If /clear doesn’t seem to work:
  1. Verify you’re in interactive mode
  2. Check if there’s a pending operation
  3. Try force-quitting and restarting:
# Force quit
Ctrl+C

# Restart
qwen

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Terminal Not Clearing

If the terminal display isn’t clearing: 
# Manual terminal clear
qwen
> /clear
# Then press Ctrl+L or run:
> clear

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Context Still Preserved

If the AI seems to remember cleared context:
  1. Wait a moment for the reset to complete
  2. Verify the new session ID changed: /stats
  3. Try restarting Qwen Code completely

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Best Practices

Don’t clear too often - each clear loses valuable context:
  • Clear when switching major topics
  • Use /compress for minor topic shifts
  • Let conversations flow naturally
Before clearing, check your usage:
> /stats
You might not need to clear yet.
Note session IDs of important conversations before clearing:
> /stats  # Note the session ID
> /clear  # Now clear

# Later resume:
qwen --resume <noted-session-id>
Export before clearing if you want to keep a record:
> /export  # Save conversation
> /clear   # Then clear

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See Also

Context Management

Learn about context and token management

Session Management

Understanding sessions and history

Interactive Mode

Full guide to interactive mode

CLI Overview

All CLI commands and options