Anthropic recently launched a new premium subscription tier for its Claude AI chatbot, aimed at heavy users willing to pay significantly more for expanded access. The new Claude Max plan comes with two pricing options: $100 per month for 5 times the usage of the standard $20 Claude Pro plan, and $200 per month for 20 times the usage.
The move puts Anthropic in direct competition with OpenAI’s $200 monthly ChatGPT Pro subscription, as both companies race to monetize their AI offerings for power users.
What Claude Max Offers
Claude Max subscribers gain several key benefits beyond the standard Pro plan:
- Substantially higher usage limits for extensive AI interactions
- Priority access to new features and models
- Higher output limits for more detailed responses
- Priority access during high-traffic periods
“The top request from our most active users has been expanded Claude access. The new Max plan delivers exactly that,” Anthropic’s announcement reads. “With up to 20x higher usage limits, you can maintain momentum on your most demanding projects with little disruption.”
User Backlash Over Session Limits
Despite the increased usage allowance, Claude Max has sparked criticism from users over its session limitations. The $200 monthly plan reportedly restricts subscribers to just 50 sessions per month, with each session defined as a 5-hour window starting with the first message.
“So, if you send one message in the morning, one in the midday, one in the evening, that is three sessions and doing that for 16 days will see you limited,” one user complained on Reddit. “Calling this shit-tier would be a compliment.”
Some users have also reported that the existing $20 Claude Pro subscription now seems to hit rate limits faster than before, leading to speculation that Anthropic might be nudging users toward the more expensive Max tiers.
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Strategic Move in AI Competition
Anthropic’s product lead Scott White didn’t rule out even costlier subscriptions in the future. When asked by TechCrunch about a potential $500 monthly Claude plan, White responded: “We’ll always keep a number of exploratory options available to us.”
The introduction of premium tiers reflects growing efforts by AI companies to generate revenue. Two months after launching ChatGPT Pro, OpenAI reportedly told investors its annualized revenue grew by $300 million.
Unlike OpenAI’s ChatGPT Pro, however, Claude Max doesn’t offer unlimited usage. It also lacks some features available to ChatGPT users, such as image generation and voice mode. Claude is instead known for its natural writing style, strong coding capabilities with real-time visualization, and emphasis on safety.
New Revenue Streams
To manage the high costs of developing advanced AI models, Anthropic is exploring multiple revenue channels beyond consumer subscriptions. The company recently launched Claude for Education targeting university customers with specialized capabilities.
The higher-priced subscription tiers come after Anthropic raised $3.5 billion at a $61.5 billion post-money valuation. The company also has significant backing from Amazon.
White said Anthropic’s new Claude 3.7 Sonnet AI model, which the company describes as its first “reasoning model,” has created “a lot of demand” for its products. Anthropic declined to reveal how many Claude subscriptions it has sold to date.
The company has also announced its first developer conference, “Code with Claude,” signaling a growing focus on the developer community.
As AI models become more sophisticated and expensive to run, users can likely expect similar premium tiers from other companies looking to balance accessibility with sustainable business models.
Frequently Asked Questions
Claude Max is Anthropic’s premium subscription tier for their AI chatbot Claude. It offers significantly higher usage limits than the standard Claude Pro plan. Claude Max comes in two tiers: a $100/month plan with 5x the usage of Claude Pro, and a $200/month plan with 20x the usage. Unlike the $20/month Claude Pro plan, Max subscribers also get priority access to new features and models, higher output limits, and priority access during high-traffic periods.
Claude Max offers two pricing tiers: $100 per month for 5x the usage of Claude Pro, and $200 per month for 20x the usage of Claude Pro. The standard Claude Pro plan costs $20 per month. At the $200 price point, Claude Max directly competes with OpenAI’s ChatGPT Pro, which also costs $200 per month but offers unlimited usage. Claude Max’s pricing reflects Anthropic’s strategy to monetize their AI services for power users who need extensive access to the tool.
Claude Max’s $200/month plan reportedly limits users to 50 sessions per month, with each session defined as a 5-hour window that starts with your first message. If you use Claude again within those 5 hours, it still counts as one session. However, if you wait more than 5 hours before sending another message, it counts as a new session. Users are concerned because this structure can be restrictive for those who interact with Claude frequently throughout the day but in short bursts. For example, using Claude in the morning, midday, and evening would count as three separate sessions, quickly consuming the monthly allowance.
While both Claude Max and ChatGPT Pro cost $200 per month at their highest tier, there are significant differences. ChatGPT Pro offers unlimited usage, while Claude Max has usage limits (though much higher than Claude Pro). ChatGPT Pro includes features like image generation (via DALL-E), voice mode, web search, and a marketplace for custom GPTs. Claude, on the other hand, is known for its natural writing style, strong coding capabilities with real-time visualization through Artifacts, and emphasis on safety. Your choice between the two would depend on which features are most important for your specific needs.
Claude Max is designed for power users who rely heavily on AI for their daily work. According to Anthropic, it’s ideal for people who need extended conversations to refine and perfect their work, regularly work with substantial documents and complex data, have deadlines that can’t wait for standard usage limits, and find themselves turning to Claude throughout the day for various tasks. The $100/month tier is pitched as “ideal for frequent users who work with Claude on a variety of tasks,” while the $200/month tier is for “daily users who collaborate often with Claude for most tasks.”
Some users have reported that the existing $20 Claude Pro subscription now seems to hit rate limits faster than before the launch of Claude Max. This has led to speculation that Anthropic might be adjusting the limits on the lower-tier plan to encourage users to upgrade to the more expensive Max options. However, these are user reports and haven’t been officially confirmed by Anthropic. The rate limits prevent users from interacting with Claude until a specified time has passed, which can be frustrating for those who rely on consistent access to the AI.
