If ChatGPT is the Starbucks on every corner, Claude.ai is the coffee shop down the street that fewer people know about, but makes better coffee. I’ve paid $40 for Claude Pro the past two months so you didn’t have to. Is it worth it over the free version of Claude? Is it better than ChatGPT? Is it THE best LLM? Here’s my take

Claude is an AI language model by Anthropic. They brand themselves as the more refined LLM with a better default voice and stronger ethical compass than most others. It has fewer users than ChatGPT, but seems to have more die-hard enthusiasts than ChatGPT. 

Free vs Pro Features

Is there a compelling reason to pay for Claude Pro over the free version? At the time of publishing this article, Claude frequently reports high user volume and defaulting responses to concise. If you want to access the more unique file uploads and larger context windows without having your use throttled, the answer is yes.

But is the paid version of Claude better than the paid versions of Perplexity.ai and ChatGPT? Let’s compare

Unique Features of Claude Pro:

• Higher context window than GPT or Perplexity. For most people, most of the time it won’t matter. However, if you are using a persistent chat or uploading a large file like a book length PDF, Claude clearly wins here (200k token limit vs 32k for paid GPT & Perplexity)
• Ability to create and share prompts that Claude helps you improve. While users can do this in a manual way with any LLM, Claude has a built-in feature where it will automatically give you suggestions to improve a prompt. This feature is accessed through the Claude Console

• Writing styles can be created and saved. Basically, you can paste in or upload sample text to “train” Claude to write with a similar style which you provided. By default, they have Normal, Concise, Explanatory, and Formal. What is this useful for? It’s hard to say how well you can train Claude to write in a specific style, as it’s more of a caricature than anything. But having this variable independent from Projects & Artifacts makes the different features of Claude clearly work better together than ChatGPT’s. (Looking at you ChatGPT Canvas Mode that doesn’t support CustomGPTs.)

• Claude’s Default tone is more “humanized.” This one is impossible to quantify, but many users, myself included, find the vanilla version of Claude to have a “better” tone than ChatGPT or other LLMs. While users can obviously adjust the tone through prompting and Writing Styles mentioned above, the reality is most people won’t do this. Claude 3.5 Sonnet is definitely one of my favorite models, I even use it as the default inside of Perplexity.ai (I’ll explain why I LOVE this combo later!)
• Projects are the first of two great features of Claude Pro. What is a Project? Think of it like a working conversation where you don’t have to repeatedly give context or re-upload files. It is similar to a CustomGPT in that you can prompt it with specific instructions that always apply to subsequent conversations within that Project, but it falls short of CustomGPTs in that it isn’t shareable or accessible by other users. The exception to this is if you are on a Claude Teams plan which is $30/month and requires a minimum of 5 team members. 
• Artifacts feature for distinct content types. This is THE single best unique feature of Claude Pro, hands down. An artifact is basically a pop-out window where you can create the product you are prompting Claude about. Examples include: if you have a table of data, you can create an Artifact to graph it. You can run code, format documents, create HTML that renders as a webpage, SVG images, and diagrams. Basically, you can generate visuals of what Claude is outputting in a side by side window. Here is an example of a simple SVG image it generated for me in an Artifact. I was having it create a workflow for a Google Sheets project with multiple tabs and steps involved.

• The best part of the Artifacts feature? You can download them or publish them to a shareable link! 

https://claude.site/artifacts/2ade12e1-9df4-4c1a-bfb1-7022ede8002c

What’s Missing From Claude Pro?

• No internet access! Current training cutoff is April 2024 (this is huge for me as a historian and researcher, having a tool that can’t answer who won the 2024 presidential election in mid-December is…tough to accept)

• Little to no ability to work with links
• Projects aren’t shareable outside of a $30/mo Team plan
• Desktop App is “Beta” and very barebones
• No true voice mode
• Can’t access Writing Styles on the mobile app

The Verdict ⚖️

Worth It For:

• Writers and content creators
• Developers/programmers (I don’t do much coding, but every serious coder I know vastly prefers Claude to GPT or other LLMs)
• Someone wanting a better default tone than ChatGPT
• Anyone doing complex analysis or long-form writing

Not Worth It For:

• People who need internet access (ME!)
• Users who like ChatGPT’s unique interfaces like Advanced Voice Mode, Canvas, and Search GPT
• Those who need to share their custom projects, such as CustomGPTs or Perplexity Spaces

As someone who already pays for ChatGPT Plus & Perplexity, I’m not going to renew my Claude Pro subscription at the end of this month. I ran multiple projects and used it daily for almost two months. Ultimately, Perplexity will remain my default search engine, but Claude 3.5 Sonnet is still my default language model within Perplexity. For someone who wants the internet access & source first interface Perplexity provides with the language model of Claude, I highly recommend this combo!

ChatGPT offers more unique interfaces, and as someone with English Language Learners in my classroom, Advanced Voice Mode is great. I also have a ton of time and energy invested in CustomGPTs that are simply more accessible & convenient than Claude Projects. I can see why some people choose Claude Pro over ChatGPT Plus, but as someone who doesn’t use LLMs to code & wants internet access, I respectfully disagree with this sentiment.

What did I miss? Do you pay for Claude Pro? 

Do you think it’s better for your purposes than ChatGPT, Perplexity, Gemini, Llama, etc? 

Tag or forward this to that tech nerd in your life who will want to tell me what I got wrong!