The docs say that CLAUDE_CODE_EFFORT_LEVEL controls adaptive reasoning intensity, and CLAUDE_CODE_DISABLE_ADAPTIVE_THINKING bypasses that entirely in favor of a fixed budget via MAX_THINKING_TOKENS. So setting both is contradictory. If true, disabling adaptive thinking would override what effort level is trying to do.
So if it bypasses, is the optimal setting for performance setting effort level to max, keeping adaptive on? I try to avoid letting the model decide what is unimportant and needs less thought
https://code.claude.com/docs/en/env-vars