Anthropic quietly doubles its estimate for how much engineers can expect to spend on Claude Code tokens

• Anthropic’s estimate of how much the average developer spends on the token “per active day” more than doubled.

• Today, Anthropic estimates the average cost per developer per day is about $13.

• Earlier this month, the artificial intelligence startup said it would charge $6 per developer per day.

The cost of Cloud Code yesterday was different than it is today.

More specifically, at some point in the past few weeks, Anthropic’s public estimate of how much enterprise developers and nearly all regular users are spending on Claude Code tokens more than doubled.

Anthropic now says the average cost per active day per developer is $13, and “for 90% of users,” the cost per active day is still less than $30.

“In enterprise deployments, the average cost per active day per developer is approximately $13, $150-$250 per developer per month, and 90% of users stay under $30 per active day,” the Claud Code website reads. “To estimate the spend for your own team, start with a small pilot group and use the tracking tools below to establish a baseline before a wider rollout.”

An archived version of the same page shows that before April 16, the previous estimate was $6 per active day per developer, with the cost per active day still being less than $12 “for 90% of users.”

Tokens are how large language models break down words Digital input and output are essentially the building blocks of artificial intelligence chatbots like Anthropic’s Claude.

Ed Zitron, CEO of technology and business PR firm EZPR, first pointed out the changes at X. Zitron was previously a columnist for Business Insider.

These changes are just a microcosm of a larger problem: The cost of artificial intelligence is rising.

This is a change that affects everyone, from everyday users to developers to large companies. The rise of AI agents in particular has pushed leading edge AI model providers like Anthropic and hyperscale providers to the brink of collapse as they struggle to keep up with skyrocketing computing demands.

Anthropic sparked user outrage last week when it appeared that Claude Code was no longer listed as available to Pro users on Anthropic’s pricing page. Anthropic later said it was testing a change on 2% of new users.