When you ask Claude "what changed recently?", it runs commands in parallel: git status for untracked and modified files, git diff for the actual line changes, and git log for recent commit history.
This gives Claude a full picture before it does anything. It knows which files are staged, what the current branch is, and what patterns the team uses for commit messages. I'll note that this context shapes every suggestion Claude makes afterward. You can also ask directly: "give me a summary of what's staged" or "show me the diff for auth.js" and Claude will run the right git command and explain the output.