Session Bloat No More: How One Developer Engineered a 90% Compression Solution

Claude Code sessions accumulate stale data—old screenshots, file contents, and build logs—that consume precious context window space and cause the AI to forget earlier conversations. One developer identified that 93% of a 73MB session file was unnecessary tool outputs and built Session Distiller, a deterministic filtering tool that preserves conversation verbatim while removing stale data, achieving a 90% size reduction. This solution highlights a critical challenge for long-running AI-assisted development: maintaining conversation quality without wasting context on outdated information.