TIL: How to stop Claude Code from adding itself as co-author and contributor in GitHub

Claude Code has this interesting default behavior where it adds itself as a co-author to every commit it helps you make. You'll see something like this in your commit messages:

Co-authored-by: Claude <[email protected]>

And it's also listed as a contributor in the GitHub repository.

While it's nice that Claude wants to share credit for the work, sometimes you just want to be the sole author of your commits. Maybe you're working on a personal project, maybe you have contribution requirements at work, or maybe you just don't want an AI showing up in your GitHub contribution graph.

The fix is simple. Add this to your Claude Code settings:

{
  "includeCoAuthoredBy": false,
  "gitAttribution": false
}

The settings file location depends on your operating system:

• macOS/Linux: ~/.claude/settings.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\claude-code\settings.json

If the file doesn't exist yet, just create it with the content above.

What do these settings do?

• includeCoAuthoredBy: Prevents Claude from adding the "Co-authored-by" line to commit messages
• gitAttribution: Disables all forms of Git attribution that Claude might add

After making this change, your commits will be 100% yours again. No more explaining to your team why an AI assistant is showing up as a contributor to your repository.

Of course, Claude still did help you write the code. But now that's just between you and Claude. Your little secret.