How to resume the conversation?

[chachako]

In Claude Code, I can always recover the last conversation through resume after each instance restart. Does Gemini have something similar?

Moreover, during the conversation, I can edit the previous historical conversation and return to that moment by pressing ESC twice in CC. Currently, it seems that the only similar thing I see is /chat save. Is this the correct direction? This seems cumbersome.

[behole]

Manage conversation history. Usage: /chat <list|save|resume> [tag]

[chachako]

Not sure if I’m misunderstanding, but it seems like I have to run /chat save before every message; otherwise, /chat resume can’t quickly jump back to the point I want. It’s currently hard to navigate to a specific past message.

I often get incorrect responses, and I’d like to undo just that one reply and retry with a different prompt.

[markmcd]

This is a fair point. You're right that the current support is /chat and this would be a good FR.

[chachako]

Thanks! FR: #1769

[wnaszko]

This is pain point to be fixed!

[Manamama]

We needed it. ♊ CLI still crashes or freezes (sometimes for half hour!) too often...

[jcs180]

does tag rely on me having previously saved a chat, manually?

[bl-ue]

Also see PR #4401.

[samuela]

It's worth noting that claude code has a really nice interface for this. There's no need to /chat save or any of that nonsense. Just run claude --resume and you're back where you left off.

[feelmyears]

That is worth noting, indeed.

[vinayakankugoyal]

I concur. Very noteworthy.

[bl-ue]

@samuela, @feelmyears, and @vinayakankugoyal: Look at #4401 and watch the video. I'm working on #7662 and the subsequent PRs will be coming soon.

[arkadiusz-gorecki]

Just run claude --resume and you're back where you left off.

Gemini CLI does in fact have a --resume argument it's just not documented anywhere or I was unable to find info on it. Just run gemini --resume without any additional arguments or parameters and it will start a gemini session and resume the last chat and it doesn't need a /chat save for it to work. It is very helpful in case of a crash (that happened to me yesterday because of WebStorm).

Click for deeper explanation

I have been testing it right now by observing what happens in a ~/.gemini/tmp folder. So for every directory (let's name it "project_a") on your computer you start a gemini chat a new folder is created (inside ~/.gemini/tmp) with long string (project hash). In that folder we have files:

• "logs.json" - records absolutely everything you ever typed and sent during any chat session opened for "project_a". Does not contain gemini responses.
• "checkpoint-tag-1.json" - example file generated by command /chat save tag-1 (every /chat save a new save file is generated)
• "/chats" - directory containing every chat session .json file with timestamp. For example after a /clear and sending a new message to the model a new file is generated.

The gemini --resume resumes chat session from "/chats" with the latest timestamp.

Additional observations:

1. If during gemini chat session you log in to a different google account using /auth command everything is still saved to the same folder. That leads me to belive gemini does not log any info about which authenticated user sends the requests.
2. I think that probably all requests that are not being sent to model do not create a .json file inside "/chats". What I mean is that if you start a chat session that only has basic gemini commands like /chat list and /quit it does not generate a .json file inside "/chats" which means you cannot gemini --resume it. If there is at least one request like "Hello" (which is sent to model over the net) then it would generate a new file.
3. Since almost everything is recorded by gemini in "/chats" directory, (even without explicitly /chat saveing) you can resume any chat session you ever had by using gemini --resume. To do it you must guarantee the chat session you want to resume has the newest timestamp. You can delete other .json files or probably fabricate a fresher timestamp on a file you want to resume.

[nikhilgikiai]

Its laughable how much google is losing out because of this oversight. once this happens to you the first reaction is to simply never use gemini cli again unless you want to feel like a child who cant have that toy today it was only that one time. pathetic.

[KnightHawk06]

Do you have to save a conversation to resume it? If so, that's terrible.

[arkadiusz-gorecki]

Do you have to save a conversation to resume it? If so, that's terrible.

Not really. gemini --resume without any additional arguments or parameters will start a gemini session and resume the last chat and it doesn't need a previous /chat save. Read more in my other comment:
#1538 (reply in thread)

[devguilhermy]

You mean saving the checkpoints manually in the conv to resume them, right?
And the answer is yes --- terrible UX btw, makes no sense. Checkpoints are there to help prevent AI errors, you not gonna be creating points on every interaction just in case the AI messes up

[nikhilgikiai]

Hey a few days later but I’d say Gemini cli solved this completely. And probably better than any other cli now. I think you can resume from any message, like resume and fork from message not just session. Or maybe I was sleepy when I saw it. You don’t need to save etc.

…

On Sat, 22 Nov 2025 at 4:21 pm, Arkadiusz Górecki ***@***.***> wrote: Do you have to save a conversation to resume it? If so, that's terrible. Not really. gemini --resume without any additional arguments or parameters will start a gemini session and resume the last chat and it doesn't need a previous /chat save. Read more in my other comment: #1538 (reply in thread) <#1538 (reply in thread)> — Reply to this email directly, view it on GitHub <#1538 (reply in thread)>, or unsubscribe <https://github.com/notifications/unsubscribe-auth/BPOUQW7K7CDN66SP5QJR7AL36A53BAVCNFSM6AAAAACAD7O4NKVHI2DSMVQWIX3LMV43URDJONRXK43TNFXW4Q3PNVWWK3TUHMYTKMBUGU2TIMI> . You are receiving this because you commented.Message ID: ***@***.*** com>

[iRonin]

Is there a way to branch a conversation like in Claude Code with double ESC, without using the save feature?