Claude Code has a tool called AskUserQuestion. Most people don’t know it exists. It’s basically the difference between Claude guessing what you want and Claude asking what you want.

When Claude isn’t sure — which approach to take, which file to modify, what your naming convention is — it can pause and give you multiple-choice options. Not a vague “what do you think?” but concrete choices it figured out from reading your codebase.

The best way to trigger it: plan mode. Hit shift+tab, give a one-sentence description of what you want, and Claude will interview you. Each question comes with options it inferred from your code. You answer, it refines, and you end up with a solid spec before a single line of code gets written.

Thariq from Anthropic put it well: start with a minimal spec, let Claude interview you via AskUserQuestion, then execute the spec in a new session.

You can also teach Claude when to ask by putting instructions in your CLAUDE.md:

When modifying shared components, always ask which consumers should be updated.

Three things worth knowing:

• Users can always pick “Other” for free-text input — you’re never locked into the options
• multiSelect: true lets Claude show checkboxes instead of radio buttons
• There’s a 60-second timeout — if you step away, just pick the recommended option and adjust later

Think of it as Claude saying “I have options, but you know your project better.” That one pause can save you from undoing three wrong assumptions.