Anthropic is discontinuing support for its popular AI agent platform OpenClaw from its Claude subscription to address the surge in demand for chatbots.
Boris Cherny, head of Claude Code, said in an X post Friday night that starting Saturday at 12pm Pacific time, Claude subscriptions will no longer support third-party tools such as OpenClaw. Instead, users must pay through a discounted “additional usage bundle” tied to their Claude login or use a separate Claude API key through Anthropic’s developer platform, Cherny said.
Anthropic executives said the move was driven by the computing demand Anthropic is seeing from its users.
Claude has skyrocketed in popularity in recent weeks, briefly reaching the top of the US Apple App Store in March. Last week, Anthropic had to adjust Claude usage limits for subscribers due to demand.
“While we have worked hard to meet the increased demand for Claude, our subscriptions were not built for the usage patterns of these third-party tools. Capacity is a resource that we carefully manage, and we prioritize customers who use our products and APIs,” Cherny wrote in the X post.
An Anthropic spokesperson told Business Insider in a statement that using Claude subscriptions with third-party tools violates the company’s terms of service and that those tools place a “significant burden on our systems.”
OpenClaw developer Peter Steinberger told X that he and OpenClaw Foundation board member Dave Moerin tried to “talk sense to Anthropic” and delayed Anthropic’s move by a week.
“We told Anthropic that we have a lot of users who only signed up for subscriptions because of OpenClaw, so if we cut them off we would be losing money,” Steinberger told Business Insider in a text message. “Now they’re trying to hide the news on Friday night.”
OpenClaw is a fast-growing AI agent platform that connects to platforms like Claude, allowing users to deploy personal AI assistants. These assistants will be able to perform tasks in other apps and workflows.
The popularity of OpenClaw has sparked a boom in AI agents. Some users are deploying AI assistants to manage their entire daily workflow. One founder said he built nine AI agents to handle administrative tasks and personal household logistics.
Anthropic is not alone in placing restrictions on third-party tools.
Google recently took action against Gemini CLI users who use third-party tools. This move was not seen as a capacity issue, but rather a violation of the terms of service.