Anthropic added Max plans at $100 and $200 a month above its $20 Pro plan. Would heavy users pay five to ten times more?
On April 9, 2025, Anthropic introduced the Max plan for its Claude assistant: 5 times Pro's usage for $100 a month, or 20 times for $200, with priority access to new features and models. Until then, Pro at $20 was the only paid plan for individuals. This teardown looks at the decision behind it, and how you'd test it.
- Before April 2025, an individual could pay for Claude in one way: Pro, at $20 a month billed monthly.2
- Anthropic said
the top request from our most active users
was more access, and added Max at $100 (5x Pro's usage) and $200 (20x).1 - The test: is $100 an acceptable price for 5 times the usage, and who moves up? In Albi's illustrative study, respondents call $75 to $119 acceptable, and revenue per person peaks at $100.
One paid plan, and users hitting its limits
In early April 2025, Anthropic's pricing page listed Free, Pro and Team. Pro cost $20 a month billed monthly, or $18 a month with an annual subscription.2 Usage on Pro was capped, and Anthropic later wrote that its most active users' top request was expanded Claude access
.1
Raise Pro's limits, or sell more usage at a higher price?
The pricing decision: heavy users want more usage, and usage costs money to serve. Raising Pro's limits gives it to everyone at $20. A higher plan charges the people who want it, but the step from $20 has to be large enough to cover the usage and small enough that heavy users take it.
How many usage levels, at what multiples, and at what prices?
Four questions a pricing study can answer
- What parts of a premium AI assistant plan are worth paying for?MaxDiff →
- Should there be one plan above Pro, or two, and how many people would move up?Conjoint →
- What is the acceptable price range for a plan with 5 times Pro's usage?Van Westendorp →
- How many would pay $100 a month, and at what price does revenue peak?Gabor-Granger →
The order runs from the offer to the price: what buyers value, how to package it, the range they accept, then the exact price. Each question is asked separately of the two groups the change affects differently: people who hit their AI assistant's usage limit at least once a week, and people who rarely or never do. The study, run in Albi, is at the end.
Two usage levels at 5 and 10 times Pro's price
On April 9, 2025, Anthropic introduced Max with two levels: Expanded Usage
at $100 a month and Maximum Flexibility
at $200, with priority access to its newest features and models.1 Users could adjust as your needs change
.1
| Per person per month | Usage vs Pro | Price | Price per unit of Pro usage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pro | 1x | $20 | $20 |
| Max 5x | 5x | $100 | $20 |
| Max 20x | 20x | $200 | $10 |
Billed monthly. The last column is Albi's arithmetic from Anthropic's list prices and stated multiples, not an Anthropic figure. Sources: the announcement and the archived pricing pages.1,2,3 In the same week, Pro's annual price on the pricing page moved from $18 to $17 a month.2,3
Max 20x is 20 times the usage for 10 times the price
What is public
Anthropic hasn't published how many people moved to Max, or how its subscribers split between Pro and the two Max levels. This teardown makes no claim about either.
From the four questions to the decision
Illustrative study with synthetic respondents — not the company's data.We ran the four questions above as one Albi survey. The respondents are US professionals who pay for an AI assistant subscription themselves and use it for work: 150 who hit the usage limit at least once a week, and 150 who rarely or never do.
These results come from synthetic respondents: AI-modelled buyer profiles, not people. Use them to shape the question, then confirm with real respondents. Run in Albi on October 3, 2026, with 300 synthetic respondents generated by Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite. Every chart below meets the minimum sample Albi sets for its method.
What parts of a premium AI assistant plan are worth paying for?
MaxDiff · all 300Result. Three features led, nearly tied: access to the most capable model (17.2), higher limits per session (17.0) and no weekly usage cap (16.7). Longer outputs and priority access followed at about 11. The two groups wanted different things: people who hit limits weekly put higher session limits and no weekly cap far ahead of everything else, while people who rarely hit limits put the most capable model first.
For the decision: for heavy users, the product is the limit itself. A usage-based tier speaks to them; for everyone else, the best model matters more than more usage.
Should there be one plan above Pro, or two, and how many people would move up?
Conjoint · all 300 · 5 prices × 3 usage levels × 2 priority levelsPro alone vs Pro plus two Max plans: who moves up
One paid plan for individuals
| People | Revenue | |
|---|---|---|
| No plan bought (vs. these options) | 18% | — |
| Pro | 82% | 100% |
Max adds 5x and 20x usage
| People | Revenue | |
|---|---|---|
| No plan bought (vs. these options) | 5% | — |
| Pro | 32% | 7% |
| Max 5x | 46% | 53% |
| Max 20x | 17% | 40% |
Result. Price drove 54% of the choices, usage 30% and priority 16%. With Pro alone, 82% pick it and 18% pick nothing. With the two Max plans added, 63% pick a Max plan: 87% of people who hit limits weekly, and 39% of the others. With a single Max plan at $100, 58% would pick it, so the $200 level mostly splits the heavy users rather than adding new ones.
For the decision: a usage tier sorts buyers by how often they hit limits: heavy users move up, most light users stay on Pro. Caution: the share moving up is the largest in this set of teardowns and the least likely to hold at this size. The panel is all people who pay for an assistant for work, half of them heavy users, and synthetic respondents readily "buy" a $100 to $200 plan they are asked to imagine. Treat the direction, not the size.
What is the acceptable price range for a plan with 5 times Pro's usage?
Van Westendorp · all 300, then each groupResult. Across all 300, the acceptable range was $75 to $119 a month, with the optimal price at about $76. People who hit limits weekly accept $80 to $121; people who rarely do, $45 to $80.
For the decision: $100 is inside the range overall and for heavy users, and above it for light users. At $100, Max 5x is priced for the people who hit limits.
How many would pay $100 a month, and at what price does revenue peak?
Gabor-Granger · each group · $40, $60, $80, $100, $150 a monthResult. Demand is nearly flat from $60 to $100 (77% to 74% overall), then drops to 43% at $150. Revenue per 100 people peaks at $100 for both groups and overall ($7,433). At $100, 85% of people who hit limits weekly would pay, and 63% of the others.
For the decision: $100 is the revenue peak of the tested prices: buyers barely react between $60 and $100, and react sharply above it.
$100 for 5 times the usage sits inside the acceptable range and at the revenue peak; how many would really move up is the open question.
- Price: respondents call $75 to $119 acceptable for 5 times the usage, and revenue per person peaks at $100 of the tested prices (questions 3 and 4).
- Value: heavy users want the limit lifted above all else; light users want the best model (question 1).
- Packaging: heavy users move up and most light users stay on Pro; the overall share moving up here is likely overstated (question 2).
What this study can't tell you: the real share of subscribers who would move to Max. The panel over-represents heavy users compared with a typical subscriber base, and synthetic respondents are likely to overstate willingness to pay for a much more expensive plan; testing with real buyers is the next step. It also leaves out the cost of serving 5 or 20 times the usage, which is what a usage tier has to cover. Anthropic hasn't published what happened (see Result).
How each method works, and how many respondents you need: Van Westendorp · Gabor-Granger · MaxDiff · Conjoint · Sample size
Find out what your buyers will pay, before you change the price
Anthropic and Claude are trademarks of Anthropic, PBC. Albi has no affiliation with Anthropic, and this teardown is not endorsed by it.
Sources
- Anthropic, "Introducing the Max Plan", April 9, 2025 (Wayback Machine copy; the original address now redirects): two levels,
5x more usage than Pro
at $100 per month and20x more usage than Pro
at $200; priority access to the newest features and models;The top request from our most active users has been expanded Claude access.
web.archive.org - Anthropic pricing page, Wayback Machine copy of April 6, 2025: Free; Pro $18 a month with an annual subscription ($216 billed up front), $20 if billed monthly; Team; no Max plan. web.archive.org
- Anthropic pricing page, Wayback Machine copy of April 11, 2025: Pro $17 a month with an annual subscription ($200 billed up front), $20 if billed monthly; Max
5x–20x more usage than Pro
, from $100 per person billed monthly, with higher output limits, early access to advanced features and priority access at high traffic times. web.archive.org
We'd rather do this on your pricing than Anthropic's.
Same method, your own data behind it, and a proposal you approve or don't.