Skip to content

Getting Started

Launching

Launch from your application menu or run:

ctfl

CTFL starts as a system tray icon.

Basic interactions

  • Left-click the tray icon to open the usage popup, or to bring it to the front if it is already open behind another window. Clicking again while it is in front closes it.
  • Right-click for the context menu: Refresh Now, Profile (when more than one is found, see Profile), Settings, Check for Updates, the version entry (opens About), Restart and Quit
  • Hover over the icon to see a quick summary in the tooltip

Tray context menu Tray tooltip

Usage popup

Pick a period type in the dropdown under the plan limits: Day, Week or Month. The arrows beside it step back to earlier periods and forward again, and the name between them says which one is shown: Yesterday, Last week, September… The period's total sits next to the arrows, and the three tabs cover that period:

  • Usage — tokens per day
  • By Model — breakdown by Claude model
  • By Project — breakdown by working directory

Daily usage Per-model usage

The week starts on your locale's first day of the week. CTFL remembers the period type you picked, and the popup always opens on the current period. You can go back as far as the first day of the previous month (see History). With Estimate costs from local data turned on in Settings, the total, each day and each model also show an estimated cost at API list prices.

The popup sizes itself to its content: the list shows three to seven rows and scrolls beyond that, so the window cannot be resized, and switching tabs never changes its size. It is an ordinary window, so it stays open when you click another application.

Above the charts, the popup surfaces plan rate-limit bars fetched from claude.ai. Pro and Max plans show a session (5-hour) bar plus one bar per weekly bucket the API reports, each with its own reset timestamp. All models is always present; alongside it you may see per-model buckets such as Fable, and Claude Design in its own section. The exact set follows your plan and what Anthropic exposes, so it changes over time without a CTFL update.

A monthly spend bar appears whenever usage credits are configured — on Max and Pro as well as Enterprise — showing used / cap. It stays visible once credits are exhausted, which is precisely when the number matters. The same figures appear in the tooltip when it is enabled.

Rate-limit section of the popup

Buckets you haven't used yet (for example, Claude Design before first use) show Not used yet in place of a reset time, and are omitted from the compact tray tooltip.

Next steps