Anthropic Says AI Assistant Claude Will Remain Ad-Free

Anthropic will not add advertising to its artificial intelligence (AI) assistant Claude, the company said in a Wednesday (Feb. 4) blog post.

“We want Claude to act unambiguously in our users’ interests,” Anthropic said in the post. “So we’ve made a choice: Claude will remain ad-free. Our users won’t see ‘sponsored’ links adjacent to their conversations with Claude; nor will Claude’s responses be influenced by advertisers or include third-party product placements our users did not ask for.”

Anthropic said in the post that it made this decision because conversations with AI assistants are “meaningfully different” from interaction with search engines or social media, because some conversations are sensitive or deeply personal, because other conversations are focused on complex tasks such as software engineering, and because advertising incentives would add another level of complexity to the impact AI has on users.

The company’s post came about three weeks after OpenAI said it plans to begin testing ads in the United States for its Free and Go plans, “so more people can benefit from our tools with fewer usage limits or without having to pay.”

In October, Meta said it would begin using people’s conversations with its AI to create personalized ads and content. The company said that, for example, a voice chat or text exchange with its AI features about hiking could lead to ads for hiking boots.

Anthropic said in its Wednesday blog post that its business model is to generate revenue from enterprise contracts and subscriptions.

“This is a choice, and we respect that other AI companies might reasonably reach different conclusions,” the company said in the post.

To continue expanding access to Claude without selling ads, Anthropic offers AI tools and training to educators in more than 60 countries, makes the AI assistant available to nonprofits at a significant discount, and invests in smaller models, according to the post. The firm may consider lower-cost subscription tiers and regional pricing, it added.

“Should we need to revisit this approach, we’ll be transparent about our reasons for doing so,” Anthropic said in the post.

In Wednesday thread on X, Anthropic’s Claude account shared four videos with a common theme: “Ads are coming to AI. But not to Claude. Keep thinking.”

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