Anthropic Reinstates Third-Party Agent Use with New Credit System

Anthropic has reversed its earlier ban on using Claude subscriptions for third-party AI agents like OpenClaw, introducing a new "Agent SDK" credit system. Previously, users could leverage flat-rate subscriptions for extensive programmatic use, leading to unsustainable costs for Anthropic. The new system allocates fixed, non-rollover monthly credits for programmatic tasks, shifting the cost of inefficient agent usage back to the user. While this protects Anthropic's margins and infrastructure, it significantly reduces the perceived value for power users who previously enjoyed compute arbitrage, leading to community backlash and concerns about a potential shift towards competitors like OpenAI.