Stay Within Limits

Keep long-running agent work inside the current 5-hour and weekly usage windows. Check usage before launching substantial work and between waves of parallel subagents. If an active 5-hour or weekly limit is at or above 95%, pause new work until the window is clear enough to continue safely.

Core Loop

1. Run a bounded wave of work. Default to at most 3 parallel subagents unless the user or host gives a different throttle.
2. Wait for the wave to finish. Do not interrupt in-flight subagents just to save budget; that usually loses work.
3. Check current 5-hour and weekly usage with the host's usage/budget tool.
4. If either window is at or above 95%, stop launching work and schedule a self-contained resume when the relevant window should clear.
5. On resume, re-check the real window or block before continuing. Do not trust elapsed wall-clock time alone.

Usage Signals

Prefer a first-party host usage tool when available. In Claude Code, use:

npx -y ccusage@latest blocks --active --json

Use the JSON to identify the active block start, current cost or percentage, and time remaining. On wake, compare the active block start timestamp with the previous one; a new timestamp is stronger evidence than "enough time passed."

If the tool reports cost instead of a direct percentage, convert through the current account limit when known. For Claude Max-style 5-hour blocks, some users prefer an earlier caution threshold around $500-550; treat that as a user-configured guardrail, not a universal rule. The default stop rule is still 95% of the active 5-hour or weekly limit.

Pausing And Resuming

When a wake/resume tool is available, schedule a wakeup for:

min(3600, secondsUntilWindowClears)

If the runtime clamps wake delays to 60-3600 seconds, chain wakeups for longer waits. Each wakeup should re-check usage, reschedule if still over budget, and continue only when the window is safely below the threshold.