Claude Code Billing in 2026: Subscription Usage vs the Agent Credit Pool

Claude Code has two billing models, and which one applies depends on how you run it, not just which plan you hold. When you use Claude Code interactively in the terminal or IDE on a Pro or Max plan, it draws from the same subscription usage limits as your Claude.ai chats. But starting June 15, 2026, Anthropic separates out programmatic usage: the Claude Agent SDK, the claude -p headless command, the Claude Code GitHub Actions integration, and third-party apps that authenticate through the Agent SDK will no longer count against your interactive subscription pool. Instead they draw from a new, separate monthly Agent SDK credit, billed at standard API rates. This page documents both models, the exact credit amounts per plan, and the SDK package rename you may also need to handle.

The two billing models at a glance

The dividing line is interactive vs. programmatic. One number to remember: setting an ANTHROPIC_API_KEY environment variable overrides your subscription entirely — Claude Code then authenticates with that key and bills as pay-as-you-go API usage, regardless of plan.

What changes on June 15, 2026

Per Anthropic’s support documentation: “Starting June 15, 2026, Claude Agent SDK and claude -p usage no longer counts toward your Claude plan’s usage limits.” Each subscription tier instead receives a fixed monthly Agent SDK credit. When that credit runs out, additional Agent SDK usage flows to usage credits at standard API rates — but only if you have enabled usage credits. If you have not, “Agent SDK requests stop until your credit refreshes.” Unused credits do not roll over to the next billing cycle, and there is no automatic fallback to the interactive pool.

What stays on the interactive subscription pool, unchanged: Claude conversations on web, desktop, and mobile; and interactive Claude Code in the terminal or IDE. The change is scoped strictly to programmatic execution.

How each pool is metered and priced

Claude Code “charges by API token consumption” — the underlying meter is input/output tokens, including thinking tokens billed as output. On a subscription, that token consumption is what counts against your plan limits (interactive) or your Agent SDK credit (programmatic). The Agent SDK credit and any overflow are billed at standard API list rates; the per-model API token prices below are the verified current rates.

Verified current API token prices (per million tokens) for models commonly used in Claude Code:

Subscription plan prices

These are the published Claude plan prices the Agent SDK credits attach to. The Max 5x plan starts at $100/month; the $200 figure for Max 20x is documented as the matching Agent SDK credit amount for that tier.

The SDK rename: claude-code-sdk to claude-agent-sdk

Separate from billing, the SDK itself was renamed. Anthropic’s migration guide states: “The Claude Code SDK has been renamed to the Claude Agent SDK.” If you have code on the old package, you must update the package name, imports, and one Python type. The headless CLI command name is unchanged — it is still claude -p.

# TypeScript
npm uninstall @anthropic-ai/claude-code
npm install @anthropic-ai/claude-agent-sdk

# Python
pip uninstall claude-code-sdk
pip install claude-agent-sdk

Decision: which billing path applies to your work