Anthropic Renames Claude's Max Plans and Lifts the Five-Hour Limit for Ultra Subscribers

The $200 Max 20x plan is now called Claude Ultra, and verified accounts no longer hit a usage wall every five hours. Prices are unchanged, weekly limits still apply, and newer accounts have to wait to be verified.

SAN FRANCISCO - Anthropic has renamed its two most expensive Claude subscriptions and, for its heaviest users, removed one of the limits they complain about most. “We’re renaming our Max plans,” the company’s Claude account posted on X on Friday. The $100-a-month Max 5x plan is now simply Max, and the $200 Max 20x plan is now Ultra. “Max is still $100/month, and Ultra is still $200. If you’re a subscriber, there’s nothing you need to do.”

Screenshot: @claudeai on X, Oct. 30, 2026 Screenshot: @claudeai on X

The bigger change is to the clock. Claude meters usage in a rolling five-hour window that starts with a user’s first message and resets in full five hours later, and paid plans add weekly limits on top. In the same post, Anthropic said it was removing the five-hour limit for verified Ultra accounts, starting that day with most existing subscribers. The weekly cap stays. According to Anthropic’s help center, Ultra includes 10 times the Pro plan’s usage every week, with a separate weekly limit for Fable, the company’s top model.

Verification is automatic. Anthropic says it checks Ultra accounts “using factors like your account and payment history” to prevent fraud and abuse, and that accounts not yet verified keep a temporary limit until it is lifted. Verifying a phone number at checkout “is a separate step and doesn’t remove this limit,” the help page says. Subscribers can check their status under Settings, then Usage: if there is no Current session bar, the account is verified.

Anthropic’s help center page explaining what changed from Max 20x. Image: Anthropic

Anthropic’s pricing page now describes Max as five times Pro usage every five hours and every week, with Fable included for up to half of the weekly limit and $100 a month in credits for the Claude API. Ultra adds the removal of the five-hour limit, 10 times Pro usage every week and $200 a month in API credits. In Britain the two plans are listed at £90 and £180 a month, including VAT.

Claude’s individual plans on its U.K. pricing page, with Max and Ultra on the right. Image: Anthropic

The new name also changes the math on the label. The Next Web pointed out that the old Max 20x name referred to 20 times Pro usage, while the pricing page now lists Ultra at 10 times Pro usage a week, and that Anthropic’s post did not address the difference. The help center also says Anthropic may limit usage in other ways, such as weekly and monthly caps or limits on certain models and features, “at our discretion.”

For people who run Claude Code or long background tasks for hours at a time, the change means a verified Ultra subscriber’s only fixed ceiling is the weekly one, and as Notebookcheck noted, anyone who spends that budget in two long days still has to wait for the weekly reset.