Stop selling "unlimited", when you mean "until we change our minds"

Claude Code joins the AI pricing bait-and-switch

Bottom line: Anthropic just added weekly limits to Claude Pro ($20/month) and Claude Max ($200/month), affecting their heaviest users of Claude Code…mid-workflow.

Why it matters: This is the same playbook we’ve seen AI companies use before—hook users with "unlimited" access, then cap the power users who matter most.

Theo from t3.chat summed it up perfectly: "No free lunch lasts forever."

The Same Playbook, Different Day

Here's how the AI pricing bait-and-switch works:

1. Launch with generous/unlimited limits

2. Build user dependency

3. Add caps targeting "less than 5%" of users

4. Frame as "sustainability" or "fairness"

Sound familiar? That's because we've seen this movie before. Cursor did it. Windsurf followed. GitHub Copilot tightened screws. Now Claude Code.

The thing is, Anthropic isn't wrong about the economics. Running Claude Sonnet or Opus models costs real money—we're talking about serious compute infrastructure here. But that's precisely why the bait-and-switch approach is so damaging to the developer community.

That "5%" Drives Everything

Who actually gets hit by these limits:

• Power users with deep workflow integration

• Early adopters who took platform risks

• Team influencers who drive organizational adoption

• $200/month Claude Max subscribers doing serious work

The real damage: You're not frustrating 5% of users—you're breaking trust with the exact people who drive growth and adoption.

The Trust Tax Adds Up

Every bait-and-switch makes developers hedge bets instead of fully committing. Or maybe, at “best” they delay AI adoption, waiting for "stable" pricing. Or perhaps worst of all…self-limit usage to avoid hitting caps.

@dvyio on Twitter/X called this “vibe limiting”

And on HackerNews, wowfunhappy observed:

I'm probably not going to hit the weekly limit, but it makes me nervous that the limit is weekly as opposed to every 36 hours or something. If I do hit the limit, that's it for the entire week—a long time to be without a tool I've grown accustomed to!

When developers get "rate limit exceeded" while debugging at 2 AM, they're not thinking about your infrastructure costs—they're shopping for alternatives.

The Economics Aren't Secret

We all know AI inference costs money. Developers get resource constraints…we have them ourselves!

What we don't get: Being sold "unlimited" and then discovering asterisks after we've built workflows around your tool.

What we want: Transparent costs upfront so we can make informed decisions.

As landl0rd on HN pointed out:

You can tell how it's intentional with both OpenAI and Anthropic by how they're intentionally made opaque. I cant see a nice little bar with how much I've used versus have left on the given rate limits

A Different Approach: More AI for Less Money

At Kilo Code, we skipped the charade:

• No "unlimited" promises with hidden limits

• Transparent pay-per-use from day one

• You control spending and usage

• Credits never expire (bonus credits do)

This week only: 300% bonus credits on every deposit. Add $20, get $80 total.

Translation: While Claude limits $200/month users, you get $200 of AI coding help for $50. The only limit? You have to use your bonus credits within 30 days. Keep what you pay for forever.

It's not rocket science. It’s our way of attracting users. Not bait and switch, but credits to try.

The Real Choice

I firmly believe that AI will not replace developers, but a developer using AI will replace a developer who does not.

But having said that, the AI space needs to grow up. Users are getting smarter about pricing games.

For companies: Be honest about costs, let users control limits, and make pricing predictable.

For developers: Stop accepting bait-and-switch as “normal.” There are transparent alternatives.

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Ready for honest AI pricing? Try Kilo Code and get 300% bonus credits this week.