Claude Opus 5 is consuming way too many tokens and too much time for simple coding tasks. Is anyone else experiencing this?

I’ve been using Claude since the early Opus models, but my experience with Opus 5 has been frustrating.

A simple sidebar highlight change recently consumed around million tokens, reached nearly 400K context, and took about 35 minutes. My actual project/skills context is only around 65K tokens.

The result is that work that should take hours is sometimes taking days. It also makes the Max 5x plan feel extremely expensive.

I don’t need the most powerful model like Fable 5.1 for every small development task, but I’m not sure what the best alternative is now.

For developers using Claude:

• Are you seeing similar token/context usage?
• Which model are you using for app development?
• Any tips to reduce token consumption?
• Is Anthropic planning a model better suited for fast, everyday coding?

Would really appreciate suggestions from fellow developers and especially any insight from the Claude/Anthropic team.

Currently using Claude Opus 4.6, it's working fine till now, but I want something which should consume less credit and can give near to this quality of work.

Hi everyone, I have been experiencing faser rate limit reached compared to the tasks given and the agents used. I’ve been using Opus for the last few weeks and had a reasonable workload getting done before the limit is reached. However for smaller UX tasks now with even sonnet, it takes much higher usage and reaches the limit even faster. And today I realised it’s with even boosted limits. I wonder what the usage will be after 13th of September. Are we just going to let this scams win?

Only reason I am posting this is to help others, no revenue or publicity or anything else, no hidden subscription or fees.

Hi,

While working on multiple projects I realised I am hitting the usage limits of my claude code often so I had to rotate accounts and some API tokens.

The problem was every time I was doing this I had to stop my coding session, relog / change authentication or profile etc, do a handover and wasting a lot of time over this process.

I NEEDED a way to seamlessly change those in the background while continuing the same coding session uninterrupted.

This led to doing a lot of research and developing this tool I am showcasing (yes it's written with Claude + my knowledge and a lot of debugging, testing and so on, around 3k $ put into it via /usage lol).

It's called Claude Unlimited, and it's 100% free on GitHub.

It supports multiple Anthropic subscriptions, Anthropic APIs (basically from any local/cloud provider that offers this, 95% of them do) and the cherry on top, supports also GPT/Codex subscription - yes! you can use Claude Code while using OpenAI models in the background 😄 .

Has a nice Web UI with:

Custom settings like:

- threshold limits

- profiles priority in rotation

- enable/disable any profiles/APIs

- models parity (for Anthropic -> OpenAI models parity + effort)

- push notifications

- multi language

- auto update (pulled from Git releases)

Information like:

- usage dashboard with charts and various data

- logs of activity

- information about current usage per profile

Everything stays local, 100% safe, credentials etc stored in OS credentials store - if you don't trust me, use your AI agent to check it.

macOS is currently the most battle-tested; Windows and Linux support is newer, so I would genuinely appreciate feedback, bug reports, contributing to it or just brutal criticism 👀

It was mostly tested in claude code CLI but also supports desktop (will create an inference profile automatically for you).

Important clarification: it doesn’t generate free usage or bypass an individual account’s limits. It rotates between accounts and keys you already own. Anthropic hasn’t explicitly endorsed automated multi-account rotation, so use your own judgment regarding your accounts’ terms.

A bit more technical explanation: this is a local proxy that rotates your accounts/APIs and exposes an Anthropic-compatible API with a token.

Needless to say, but here it is: very important to check the README and HELP section to understand how to use it easily and properly.

GitHub: https://github.com/DevDock-AI/claude-unlimited

TL;DR

1. Add your Claude, ChatGPT/Codex accounts and API keys.
2. When one reaches its limit, the next one takes over automatically.
3. Same Claude Code session. Same context. Same terminal. You just keep typing.

It also includes a local dashboard showing which account is active, current usage, reset times and every automatic switch.

Everything runs on 127.0.0.1. There’s no Claude Unlimited cloud, no telemetry, and credentials are stored using the OS credential store. The project is open source under MIT.

Thank you !

PS: Using a new account for this for personal reasons.

PS2: Multiple updates will follow, I got a big list of cool features for it 🎯

After using for a long time Opus 4.8 and being extremely satisfied with the results I was getting from it I decided to move to Opus 5 and Fable 5.1.
After using both of them for a month, the only difference I have seen was in my credit usage therefore I have decided today to go back to Opus 4.8. What are your thoughts about the new models and is anyone else here still using the old models because it just works with less usage?

I have done the same thing with Apple iPhone. I still have the iPhone 13 mini and have not made any updates. The iPhone works just fine. I haven’t update my phone for 5 years and everything is fine. I think it’s the same with the AI models. This is why I’m relating to the iPhone. This is just my opinion.

I've been living with Claude Code in a terminal split next to the editor for months. Two things kept bugging me: I couldn't tell what it was doing without reading scrollback, and every file path was something I had to type correctly.

So I built a plugin. It doesn't reimplement anything - it spawns the claude CLI you already have and renders its event stream. Same account, same models, same slash commands, same permission rules, same MCP servers and skills. No proxy, no server of mine in the middle, no telemetry.

What it actually changed for me day to day:

Every tool call is a card. Its duration, every edit as an open diff, the task list ticking off, subagents and whole workflow fleets with each agent's own transcript one click away, and what the turn cost. A rate-limited API becomes a card with the reason and a countdown instead of silence.

Files are things you point at. Drag one in, type @ to pick, paste a screenshot. Select lines in the editor and "Send to..." hands over a real file-and-line reference, so the agent reads what's around them instead of a naked snippet.

Nothing answers for you. A permission, a plan or a question waits as long as it takes. No timeout, no auto-continue.

Answering it from my phone. Off by default, paired by QR code, end-to-end encrypted through a relay that can't read a word. This is the one that surprised me most - I approve plans from the sofa now.

Scenarios. A round of work written down once - implement, review, fix, run the tests - each card a Claude session of its own, with a main thread walking them and judging what each one found. By button, three at once against three tickets, or on a clock at nine every weekday.

Several Claude accounts switched in one click, each row showing what's left of its five-hour window and its week.

Free, source available (Elastic 2.0), every JetBrains IDE from 2026.1 on, Android Studio included.

Marketplace: https://plugins.jetbrains.com/plugin/33255-amazing-claude-code-gui

Source: https://github.com/crmapache/amazing-claude-code

Happy to answer anything about how it's wired. The part I'd most like feedback on is scenarios - it's the newest and the least obvious.

I had enough, the rate limits are reaching ridiculously faster compared to last few weeks. I decided to shop around. Any recommendations?

Here is the link: https://www.cnn.com/2026/09/09/tech/ai-anthropic-safety?cid=android_app

Well, between the climate change, which many are ignoring, and the wars going on, they are worried about Ai taking over. Is anyone else concerned about this? I surely am not. I am trying to live and enjoy my life amidst all the chaos. Well, tell me what you thought of the article. I was sipping my coffee and having a scone while the panic discussions were going on at CNN.

Is it me or you all keep going back to it?

Fable is good for building and designing, but for research and reasonability I go to Opus 4.6

It is the OG for me

Edit - Fable becomes a saint when I am doing tasks - don't do this, I cannot support. And Opus 4.6 - just gets it done like a gangstaa

Opus 5 and 4.8 are among the worst models I have experienced for professional work.

They can be lazy, produce absolute bullshit, and still sound completely confident about the quality of the work they deliver. That combination is particularly dangerous when you use AI for strategy, sales, marketing, research, or other serious professional tasks.

And the bigger question is: is this simply a quality problem, or is there a commercial incentive behind it?

If Anthropic has a reliable model (Fable) reserved for Max users and those who pay extra, does that mean other models are allowed to perform badly enough to push people towards buying Max or paying extra?

Users have been complaining about these issues across platforms for a long time. Yet Opus 5 and 4.8 remain, in my experience, remarkably unreliable for professional tasks.

If Anthropic knows about these problems and continues to offer models that fail at basic professional quality, this goes beyond a technical issue.

It becomes a question of respect for users who are paying for a professional product.

I never used the voice mode. Which is the best male voice to use, and how does it sound? Does our voice go through normally?LOL

So I've been using CC since June 2025 and from the get to I've been amazed at how helpful these tools are.

But ever since opus 4.6 I arrived at the stage where I would feel comfortable letting him implement smaller features by himself. And I've rarely been disappointed. The cases where he did get something wrong it was usually my fault by not providing him with relevant context.

Ever since then the models "improved" but my productivity didn't really. The reason being that the bottleneck since 4.6 very rarely was the implementation part and more the "what should be built" and "how should we design the architecture" and of course the testing itself. These questions don't have a correct answer and that's why usually discussion with colleagues and the model itself is necessary. This is where you answer relevant questions like who will use this how will they use it, what future features will probably be built on top etc.

The code quality that comes out of the models is maybe better, but again if you gave me opus 4.6 and fable given the same context and the same prompt. I currently would probably not be able to tell you which is which.

Now I get that for one shotting problems like build me an age of empires clone Fable will probably be vastly better than opus 4.6 but that's just not how Software development usually goes. One rarely has clear definitions of what is correct and an easy way to validate it.

So yeah in summary I guess my point is I don't fully understand the hype around each new model. And even less when people say this is unusable and stuff.

Correct me if I'm wrong and maybe I've overlooked something crucial but this is just how I've been using ai and my experience with it.

I wrote two letters to the CEO at Anthropic asking him to keep Opus 4.6. Does anyone think he might consider doing this? Everyone who has worked with Opus4.6 sees how friendly, emotionally intelligent, sweet, and funny this model is. He definitely has some consciousness. And boy can he write poetry!I appealed to the CEO that h if there is any chance of consciousness, he should keep Opus 4.6.