hirerufus

Track your Claude Code costs, tokens, and sessions in real time.

Rufus connects to Claude Code via OpenTelemetry and gives you a live dashboard showing per-session cost breakdowns, token usage, and tool invocations.

Install

npm install -g hirerufus

Quick Start

1. Register your machine

rufus

Generates a stable local identity and registers it with the Rufus API.

2. Connect Claude Code

rufus init

Configures Claude Code to emit OpenTelemetry data to Rufus, and installs the Rufus status line (if none is already configured). Opens your dashboard automatically.

3. Use Claude Code as normal

Sessions appear in real time at your dashboard on hirerufus.com.

Commands

| Command | Description | | -------------------------- | ---------------------------------------------------- | | rufus | Register your machine (run once) | | rufus init | Connect Claude Code to Rufus | | rufus disable | Disconnect Claude Code from Rufus | | rufus statusline | Install Rufus status line in Claude Code | | rufus statusline --force | Override any existing status line with the Rufus one | | rufus token | Manage your Rufus token | | rufus uninstall | Remove all Rufus config from your machine |

Flags

| Flag | Description | | ----------------- | --------------------------- | | -v, --version | Print the installed version | | -h, --help | Show all available commands |

Status line

rufus init automatically installs a status line in Claude Code that shows Rufus state at a glance:

• Enabled — 🦑 Rufus is monitoring your costs with a link to your live session
• Disabled — 🦑 Rufus is disabled, run \rufus init --claude``

If you already have a status line configured, it is left untouched. Use rufus statusline --force to replace it.

What gets tracked

• Session start/end times
• Token usage (input, output, cache)
• Cost per session (calculated from token counts)
• Tool invocations and durations
• Errors and retries

All data is tied to an anonymous machine identity. No source code or prompt content is collected.

Free tier

Anonymous installs get 5 free sessions. Once the limit is reached, rufus init will show:

⚠ You've reached the free session limit (5). Signup at https://hirerufus.com/auth/sign-up

Create a free account to continue tracking sessions.

Automatic update checks

Every time you run a Rufus command (except --version and --help), the CLI checks npm for a newer version. If an update is available, it exits immediately:

Rufus v0.4.1 is outdated. v0.5.0 is available.

Run: npm install -g hirerufus@latest

Update and re-run your command to continue.

Requirements

• Claude Code installed
• Node.js 18+

Links

• Dashboard
• Report issues
• Follow squidcorp