In this guide
TL;DR: If you had a ChatGPT Pro 200 subscription at any point between September 22 and 10 a.m. Pacific on September 29, 2026, you keep the previous Codex and ChatGPT allowance through October 29, 2026. After that it drops, and the price stays $200. Claude Max’s “5x” and “20x” refer to Pro’s usage per five-hour session, with weekly limits on top. Neither company publishes exact numbers.
This is a sourced explainer. We did not buy these plans or measure usage ourselves. Every limit and price below comes from Anthropic’s or OpenAI’s own pages, checked on October 17, 2026 and re-checked October 18, 2026. Where a number isn’t published, we say so instead of guessing.
What changes on October 29 (ChatGPT Pro 200)
Who keeps the old allowance
OpenAI’s help page states the grandfathering rule: you qualify if “you had an active Pro 200 subscription at any point from September 22, 2026 through 10 a.m. Pacific Time on September 29, 2026.” Eligible customers “can use the previous included allowance through October 29, 2026 while their Pro 200 subscription is active.” (OpenAI Help: About ChatGPT Pro tiers, checked 2026-10-17)
If your subscription lapsed and you resubscribe on the same account, you still qualify as long as you were active during that window (same page). Only affected users get an email about the change.
What happens after
After October 29, a grandfathered subscription “will move to the lower included usage allowance,” and the price “stays at $200/month.” New Pro 200 subscriptions already get “a lower usage allowance than previously offered.”
What OpenAI has not published: how much lower the new allowance is. Neither the help page nor the ChatGPT pricing page (checked 2026-10-17) gives a number or a multiplier for Codex on Pro. The pricing page lists Codex as “Expanded” on Pro and says Pro offers “your choice of 3 usage tiers.” Figures circulating on social media and in news coverage are not on OpenAI’s pages, so we don’t repeat them.
The three Pro plans
| Plan | Price (USD/month) | Ultrafast |
|---|---|---|
| Pro 100 | $100 | Not included |
| Pro 200 | $200 | Not included |
| Pro 500 | $500 | Included |
| Source: OpenAI Help, About ChatGPT Pro tiers (checked 2026-10-17). OpenAI says Pro 200 includes more usage than Pro 100, and Pro 500 the most. Pro is billed monthly only. |
What makes your allowance run out faster
OpenAI says usage depends on “the model, the amount of context processed, reasoning, tool use, information retrieval, caching, and speed mode.” Compared with Standard mode, Fast mode uses the included allowance at 2.5 times the rate. Ultrafast (Pro 500 only, for GPT-6 Astra and GPT-6.1 Sol) uses it at 8 times the rate, and purchased credits at 6 times the Standard credit rate. After your included allowance, you can buy credits for eligible features, including Codex, where available for your account. Support cannot reset limits.
How Claude limits work (Pro, Max 5x, Max 20x)
Prices
| Plan | Price | Billing |
|---|---|---|
| Pro | $20/month billed monthly, or $17/month on an annual plan ($200 up front) | Monthly or annual |
| Max 5x | $100/month | Monthly only |
| Max 20x | $200/month | Monthly only |
| Sources: Claude pricing and What is the Max plan?, both checked 2026-10-17. The Max prices are for web subscriptions; Anthropic says mobile pricing may vary. Prices exclude tax. |
Three limits, not one
Per Anthropic’s help pages (checked 2026-10-17):
- A session limit that resets every five hours.
- A weekly limit that resets once a week at a fixed time assigned to your account. It does not depend on when you subscribed. You can see your reset time in Settings > Usage.
- On Max only, a separate weekly limit for Fable (Anthropic’s top model). The pricing page lists Fable on Max as “50% of weekly limits.”
Anthropic also says it “may limit your usage in other ways, such as weekly and monthly caps or model and feature usage, at our discretion.”
What “5x” and “20x” actually multiply
Anthropic’s Max help page is specific: Max 5x “includes five times the Pro plan’s per-session usage allowance,” and Max 20x includes 20 times. The pricing page says the same thing, “per 5-hour session.” Anthropic does not say the weekly limit scales by the same factor, and it doesn’t publish the weekly amount. So “20x” is not a promise of 20 times Pro’s weekly usage.
One pool for chat and code
Claude on web, desktop and mobile, plus Claude Code in the terminal and supported IDEs, all draw from the same limits (Use Claude Code with your Pro or Max plan, checked 2026-10-17). A long chat in the morning leaves less for coding in the afternoon.
What makes Claude usage run out faster
Anthropic lists “the length and complexity of your conversations, the features you use, which Claude model you’re chatting with, and the effort level you’ve selected,” and says “there’s no fixed message count.” It notes that higher effort uses more tokens, that tools and connectors are token-heavy, and that long conversations triggering automatic context management use more of your limit (How do usage and length limits work?, checked 2026-10-17). Anthropic doesn’t publish how much each effort level costs.
Side-by-side
| Claude Pro | Claude Max 5x | Claude Max 20x | ChatGPT Pro 100 | ChatGPT Pro 200 | ChatGPT Pro 500 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price/month | $20 ($17 annual) | $100 | $200 | $100 | $200 | $500 |
| Published limit structure | 5-hour session + weekly | 5× Pro per session + weekly + Fable weekly | 20× Pro per session + weekly + Fable weekly | “Included usage”, amount not published | Lower allowance for new subs; grandfathered through Oct 29 | Highest included; Ultrafast |
| Exact numbers published? | No | No | No | No | No | No |
| Coding tool | Claude Code (shared pool) | Same | Same | Codex (“Expanded”) | Same | Same |
| After the limit | Usage credits at API rates | Same | Same | Credits where available | Same | Same |
| All cells: vendor pages listed under Sources, checked 2026-10-17. |
How to see your usage and stop surprise charges
These steps come from the vendors’ documentation. We haven’t run them ourselves.
Claude
- Open Settings > Usage to see where you stand and your next weekly reset.
- In Claude Code, Anthropic says you can “monitor your remaining allocation using the /status command.”
- If you enable usage credits, extra usage is billed at standard API rates. Set a monthly spend limit with “Adjust limit” instead of “Set to unlimited,” and decide on auto-reload deliberately (Manage usage credits, checked 2026-10-17).
- Check for an
ANTHROPIC_API_KEYenvironment variable. If one is set, Claude Code uses it instead of your subscription, “resulting in API usage charges.” - The monthly API credits included with Max can’t be used in Claude Code or the Claude apps.
ChatGPT / Codex
- View your balance in Settings → Usage in ChatGPT, or Usage & Billing in Codex (where credits are available for your account).
- Remember Fast mode spends the allowance 2.5× faster than Standard.
Which plan fits which workload
This is reasoning from the published limit structure, not from measurements.
- Mostly chat, occasional coding: the lowest paid tier of either vendor. Watch the weekly limit, not just the session.
- Coding in short daily bursts: session-based allowances matter most, which is what Claude’s 5x/20x multiplies.
- Long unattended agent runs: weekly limits are the constraint, and neither vendor publishes them. Use a spend-capped overflow (usage credits or API) rather than assuming the plan covers it.
- Grandfathered Pro 200 users: your plan doesn’t need to change before October 29. Afterwards, compare your real usage in Codex’s Usage & Billing against Pro 100 and Pro 500.
- Splitting $200 across both vendors: both companies sell a $100 tier (Claude Max 5x, ChatGPT Pro 100). Whether two smaller allowances beat one larger one depends on usage that neither vendor publishes.
FAQ
When does the Pro 200 change hit me? If you’re grandfathered, after October 29, 2026. If you subscribed after the window, you already have the lower allowance.
Is Codex on Pro 200 now half the usage? OpenAI hasn’t published a figure, so we can’t say.
Does Claude Max 20x mean 20 times the weekly limit? Anthropic says 20 times Pro’s per-session allowance. It doesn’t state a weekly multiplier.
Do Claude chat and Claude Code share limits? Yes, one pool across all surfaces.
Can I keep working after a limit? Claude: with usage credits, at API rates, up to your spend limit. ChatGPT: buy credits for eligible features where available.
Can support reset my limit? OpenAI says no. Anthropic mentions “limit resets” you may have on your account; see its help center.
How we made this
This article was drafted with AI assistance and edited by OneSignalDesk. We didn’t subscribe to any plan or measure usage. Every fact comes from the first-party pages below, read on October 17, 2026 and re-checked on October 18, 2026. We don’t earn a commission from Anthropic or OpenAI, and this page has no affiliate links. See our editorial policy and disclosure.
Sources (all checked 2026-10-17, re-checked 2026-10-18)
- OpenAI Help, About ChatGPT Pro tiers: https://help.openai.com/en/articles/9793128-about-chatgpt-pro-tiers
- ChatGPT pricing: https://chatgpt.com/pricing
- Claude pricing: https://claude.com/pricing
- Claude Help, What is the Max plan?: https://support.claude.com/en/articles/11049741-what-is-the-max-plan
- Claude Help, Use Claude Code with your Pro or Max plan: https://support.claude.com/en/articles/11145838-use-claude-code-with-your-pro-or-max-plan
- Claude Help, Manage usage credits for paid Claude plans: https://support.claude.com/en/articles/12429409-manage-usage-credits-for-paid-claude-plans
- Claude Help, How do usage and length limits work?: https://support.claude.com/en/articles/11647753-how-do-usage-and-length-limits-work
