How to let candidates use Claude Code or Codex

Turn on AI assistants in the terminal in a screen's settings, or leave the AI switch on for a live coding interview. Candidates then type claude (Claude Code) or codex (Codex) in the sandbox terminal and work with the agent on the real workspace. The agents run on your organization's own Anthropic or OpenAI connection, so an owner has to connect at least one first. See Connect your Anthropic and OpenAI keys.

On a coding screen

AI assistants are off for every screen until you switch them on.

1. Open the screen in the builder.
2. In the settings rail, find Options and turn on AI assistants in the terminal.
3. Optionally enter a Token budget per candidate, in million tokens. Leave it empty for no limit. See Set token budgets for AI agents.

If your organization has no key connected yet, the rail says so: "No API key is configured yet, so candidates will see the assistant as unavailable." The Add one in Integrations. link takes you to the right place.

The setting applies to every candidate on the screen. If you change it while candidates are mid-screen, their running sandboxes pick up the change without a restart. That covers turning the agents on or off, changing the budget, and an owner adding or removing a key.

On a live coding interview

Live coding interviews start with AI agents on. You can change that at three levels:

Where	What it sets
The live coding interview's page, AI assistants in the terminal	The default for new sessions of that interview
The Invite to a live coding interview dialog, Claude Code and Codex in the terminal	This one session
The room's top bar, AI on / AI off	The running session, for everyone in it

In the room, interviewers can flip the switch at any time. It covers the whole shared sandbox, the change applies straight away without a restart, and the room notes who turned AI agents on or off. The candidate sees which way the switch is set but can't change it.

If a key is missing, a notice under the switch says which agent won't work, for example "There is no OpenAI key, so Codex won’t work — only Claude Code."

What candidates see

Before a screen starts, the start page lists AI assistants are available with the command to run (claude, codex, or claude or codex, depending on the keys you have). It tells them that their workspace files and what they type to the assistant go to your organization's AI provider under your account, and that reviewers can see their terminal, including the assistant's work. When conversations are recorded, it also says that the prompts, replies and the commands the assistant runs are saved and shown to reviewers.

The start page only shows this when the screen has assistants on and at least one key works.

Inside the editor:

• A hint in the header reminds them: "AI assistant: run claude in the terminal".
• A new terminal prints "AI assistant enabled for this assessment — run claude to start it." (or codex, or both).
• A small ring in the header fills toward the token budget. Hovering it shows "AI tokens: 188k of 1M used", and it turns amber close to the limit.

Claude Code and Codex open already set up for the workspace, with no sign-in or onboarding. If a candidate runs an agent that isn't enabled, the terminal answers with one line, such as "The AI assistant is not enabled for this assessment." or "codex is not enabled for this assessment — use claude."

What reviewers see afterwards

On a submission's review page:

• The header shows the attempt's token use, such as "AI 1.4M / 2M tokens", or "AI 1.4M tokens" when there is no budget.
• The AI agents tab shows each recorded conversation in order: the candidate's prompts, the agent's replies, the tools it called and their output, with the time and model on every turn.
• The Terminal tab replays the terminal, including what the agent ran there.

The AI agents tab only appears when at least one conversation was recorded for that challenge. A live coding interview's result page has the same AI agents tab, or "No AI agent was used in this session" when nobody started one.