You pay for a Claude Max subscription every month. Since 7 October 2026 it has come with an extra $100 or $200, and there is a fair chance you have not touched it yet.
These Claude Max API credits do not switch themselves on. Anthropic pays them out every month, provided you have linked your subscription to a developer account. It takes four steps, and nobody asks for a bank card.
So let's see what these credits are for, how to claim them step by step, and the trap to avoid when you confirm. You do not need to have written a line of code to follow.
What is the API credit included in Max plans?
Your Max subscription opens the Claude apps, meaning the website, the mobile app and Claude Code. The API is another way in. It is how a program or an automation talks to Claude without going through the app.
Until now, the two were paid for separately. You could be a Max subscriber and still have to get your card out to plug Claude into one of your tools.
Think of a phone contract and a prepaid card. The contract is your subscription. The API credit is a prepaid card that Anthropic tops up for you every month.
The amount depends on your plan:
| Plan | API credit per month |
|---|---|
| Max 5x | $100 |
| Max 20x | $200 |
| Team, Standard seat | $20 per seat |
| Team, Premium seat | $100 per seat |
On a Team plan, the credits for every seat go into a single pot, capped at $500 a month. Free, Pro and Enterprise plans do not qualify.
These are the amounts announced at launch. Anthropic's help page gives the current ones, and we have covered the differences between Claude Pro, Max and Team elsewhere.
Who can claim these credits?
Anthropic sets few conditions:
- An active Max or Team subscription, with no payment overdue;
- Seven days on the plan. A new subscriber therefore waits a week before seeing the offer;
- A web browser. You may have subscribed from iOS or Android, but you claim on claude.ai;
- The right role. On Max, that is you, the subscriber. On Team, you must be an owner of the team.
No bank card is required, either to claim the credit or to spend it.
You meet these conditions and nothing shows up in your settings? At launch, Anthropic said it was opening the offer gradually, over several days. After that, write to its support team.
How do you claim your API credits?
Everything happens on claude.ai, on the billing page. I admit I open mine roughly once a year (when my card expires 🥲). Here is the route:
- Open claude.ai in a browser, then go to Settings and Billing;
- Find the API credits section and click "Link organization";
- Choose the organisation that will receive the credits, or create a new one;
- Read the programme terms, then confirm with "Link organization".
On a Team plan, the owner goes through Organization settings, then Billing.
An organisation is your developer account with Anthropic, the one behind the Claude Console. You do not have one? Step 3 offers to create it on the spot.
You can link only one organisation, and you cannot change it yourself afterwards. You will have to write to Anthropic's support team. If you have several, pick the one your projects run in.
Anthropic advises signing in to the Console with the same email address as on claude.ai. If an error appears along the way, try again a few hours later.
Once the link is made, the credit appears on the Console billing page, on the "Promotional credits" line. There you can read the remaining amount and its expiry date.
What do these credits cover, and what do they not?
They pay for whatever goes through Anthropic's developer platform, with any Claude model:
- The Claude API, the one you plug into your tools and automations;
- The Playground, a Console page for trying a model without installing anything;
- Claude Managed Agents, agents that Anthropic hosts for you;
- The Claude Agent SDK, the toolkit for programming your own agent.
And this is where many people will be disappointed. These credits do not pay for Claude Code, whether you use it in the terminal, in your editor, on desktop or on the web.
They do not push back your subscription limits either. When Claude tells you that you have reached your quota, the API credit does not take over.
One exception, for developers. The claude -p command, which runs Claude Code without an interface, is covered if you run it with an API key from the linked organisation. Signed in with your subscription, it draws on your usual quota.
Finally, these credits are only good at Anthropic. Claude models rented through Amazon Bedrock, Google Cloud or Microsoft Foundry are not included. Anthropic's documentation keeps the list up to date.
What can you do with $100 or $200 of credits a month?
A lot, because the API is paid for by use. Anthropic counts in tokens, pieces of words, for what the model reads and for what it writes.
Take a simple job, drafting a reply to a client's email. Allow roughly 2,000 tokens to read and 1,000 to write. Here is what your credit pays for, depending on the model:
| Model | Price of one reply | With $100 a month | With $200 a month |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Haiku 5.5 | $0.0007 | about 140,000 replies | about 285,000 replies |
| Claude Sonnet 5.5 | $0.014 | about 7,000 replies | about 14,000 replies |
| Claude Opus 5.5 | $0.028 | about 3,500 replies | about 7,000 replies |
Even with Claude Sonnet 5.5, the all-rounder, $100 covers about 7,000 replies a month. You will never write that many!
The sum starts from the prices Anthropic publishes, per million tokens read then written. Allow $0.10 and $0.50 for Claude Haiku 5.5, $2 and $10 for Sonnet 5.5, $4 and $20 for Opus 5.5.
Where to start? Here are ideas that do not need a team:
- An automation in n8n or Make that sorts your emails or summarises your calls. You create an API key in the Console, then paste it into the tool;
- A trial in the Playground, to compare two models on your own texts before choosing;
- A custom agent, if you code, with the Claude Agent SDK.
Our n8n course shows how to connect Claude to your tools, step by step.
To make the credit last, Anthropic gives two leads. Batch processing, for work that can wait, costs half the price. Caching charges less for a text the model has already read.
What happens when the credit runs out?
Requests sent to the API stop until the next credit arrives. Nothing is charged to your Claude subscription, and your limits in the app do not move.
The new credit arrives with each billing period, shortly after your subscription payment. On an annual subscription, it still arrives every month.
Whatever you have not spent is lost. The credit does not roll over from one month to the next, so you may as well use it.
Your organisation already has a card and auto-reload switched on? It triggers on the balance you bought, even if you still have free credit left. Check that setting in the Console before launching a big job.
And what if you change plan along the way?
- You cancel or go back to Pro. New credits stop, and those already received stay usable until they expire;
- You move from Max 5x to Max 20x. You receive a prorated credit straight away, then $200 each period;
- You move from Max to Team. The Max link ends, and the team owner claims the credit after seven days.
If you are a Max subscriber, the hardest part is remembering to open the billing page. Link your organisation, create a key, and try a single automation to begin with. 😉
Frequently asked questions about Claude Max API credits
How do you claim Claude Max API credits?
On claude.ai, open Settings then Billing, and click "Link organization" in the API credits section. You choose or create a Claude Console organisation, then confirm.
The credit then arrives in that organisation with each billing period. You need to have been on a Max or Team plan for at least seven days.
Do Claude Max API credits work with Claude Code?
No. API credits do not pay for Claude Code sessions, in the terminal, in an editor, on desktop or on the web. They do not push back the subscription limits either.
They cover the Claude API, the Playground, Claude Managed Agents and the Claude Agent SDK.
Do Claude Pro subscribers get API credits?
No. At launch, on 7 October 2026, only Max and Team plans receive this credit. It comes to $100 a month for Max 5x, $200 for Max 20x, and up to $500 for a Team.
Free, Pro and Enterprise plans do not qualify.
Do unused API credits roll over to the next month?
No. Unspent credit expires at the end of each billing period, and a new credit arrives after the next payment.
If you use it up sooner, API requests stop until the next credit. Nothing is charged to the Claude subscription.
Do you need a bank card to use the API credits?
No. Anthropic states that no payment method is required on its developer platform, either to claim the credit or to spend it.
A card only helps if you want to carry on after using up the month's credit.
