Claude API: Pricing, Keys & How to Call It

The Claude API gives you Anthropic's models — Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku — and the pricing splits cleanly by tier: $5/$25 for Opus, $3/$15 for Sonnet, $1/$5 for Haiku per million tokens. This guide has the full verified table, the two discounts that cut real bills (prompt caching and batch), how to get an Anthropic key, and how to call it in a few lines — directly with the Anthropic SDK or through a gateway alongside 300+ other models.

What the Claude API is

The Claude API is Anthropic's programmatic access to its model family — Opus (the flagship), Sonnet (the balanced workhorse), and Haiku (the cheap, fast tier). Pricing is set per tier rather than per individual model, which makes the cost model unusually simple. Claude leads independent coding benchmarks in 2026, so the API is a common default for agentic and high-stakes work — with the trade-off that it's pricier than the cheapest options.

Claude API pricing

The full current table, by model, per million tokens:

Per 1M tokens, USD, June 2026. Fable 5 is Anthropic's top model but is currently suspended. Opus 4.8 and 4.7 share the same price.

The Claude tier ladder

The clearest way to read Claude pricing is as a 5× ladder from Haiku to Opus on output — the expensive side. Pick the lowest rung that clears your quality bar:

Caching & batch discounts (the real bill)

Two discounts cut Claude bills more than tier choice often does:

• Prompt caching — repeated prompt prefixes (system prompts, long context, tool definitions) bill cached input at roughly 10% of the input price. For agents that resend the same context every turn, this is the biggest single saving.
• Batch API — non-interactive jobs submitted in bulk are about 50% off. Ideal for evals, bulk classification, and offline processing.

How to get a Claude API key

1. Sign up at the Anthropic Console (platform.claude.com) and verify your account.
2. Add billing; new accounts usually get some trial credit.
3. Create a key under API keys and copy it once.
4. Store it as an env var: export ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=... — never hard-code it.

How to call the Claude API

Claude uses Anthropic's Messages API. With the official Anthropic SDK:

from anthropic import Anthropic

client = Anthropic(api_key="$ANTHROPIC_API_KEY")

msg = client.messages.create(
    model="claude-opus-4-8",           # or claude-sonnet-4-6, claude-haiku-4-5
    max_tokens=1024,
    thinking={"type": "adaptive"},     # adaptive thinking on Opus/Sonnet 4.x
    messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Review this function for bugs..."}],
)
print(msg.content)

For long outputs, stream and use the SDK's final-message helper. To reach Claude with the OpenAI SDK instead, call it through a gateway (below).

Which Claude model to use

Choosing between the top two tiers specifically? See Claude Sonnet vs Opus.

Calling Claude through a gateway

If you call more than one provider, a gateway gives you Claude plus everything else under one OpenAI-compatible key — and automatic failover when Anthropic is rate-limited. DataLLM Lab carries Claude Opus 4.7/4.6 and Sonnet 4.6 today:

from openai import OpenAI
client = OpenAI(base_url="https://www.datallmlab.com/v1", api_key="$DATALLMLAB_API_KEY")
resp = client.chat.completions.create(model="anthropic/claude-opus-4.7", messages=[{"role":"user","content":"Hello"}])

FAQ