If you’ve been hitting a wall using Claude Code recently, you’re not alone. Since Monday, many users—especially those on Anthropic’s $200/month Max plan—have been running into sudden usage limits without any prior warning or explanation.
The message? A blunt “Claude usage limit reached,” followed by a vague reset time—usually a few hours later. That’s it. No dashboard update. No usage stats. No official statement about changes. Naturally, people are frustrated. And confused.
One developer wrote on GitHub, “There’s no way in 30 minutes and a few requests I hit 900 messages. Your tracking is off.” That sentiment is echoed across threads, as longtime users try to make sense of what feels like a quiet downgrade.
While Anthropic did acknowledge the issue when asked for comment, their response didn’t offer much clarity: “We’re aware that some Claude Code users are experiencing slower response times, and we’re working to resolve these issues.” That’s it. No timeline. No update on whether this is a bug, a new policy, or a throttling experiment in disguise.
What makes it worse is the complete lack of heads-up. For many users, their entire workflow has hit pause. “It just stopped the ability to make progress,” one user told TechCrunch, adding that alternatives like Gemini and Kimi simply can’t match Claude Code’s capabilities at the moment.
Even API users aren’t spared. Anthropic’s status page shows multiple system issues this week—six separate ones in four days—yet still proudly reports “100% uptime.” Go figure.
The confusion is amplified by Anthropic’s vague pricing tiers. The Max plan is supposed to offer 20x the usage of the Pro plan, which itself is 5x what free users get—but none of those limits are clearly defined. And the company even admits usage for free and paid users “will vary by demand.” Translation? No guarantees. Which makes planning ahead impossible.
Ironically, the $200 Max plan has been so generous that some users have squeezed out over $1,000 worth of value in a single day. So yes, tighter controls might make financial sense—but users just want honesty.
As one user put it: “Just be transparent. The silence only makes people lose trust.”
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