Anthropic launches Claude 3.5 Haiku with higher costs and improved performance

Anthropic has launched its new AI model, Claude 3.5 Haiku, which is now four times more expensive to run than its predecessor. The company claims the price increase reflects the model's improved intelligence, as it outperforms the larger Claude 3 Opus in many tasks. The new pricing for Haiku is $1 per million input tokens and $5 per million output tokens, compared to 25 cents and $1.25 for the previous version. This change has sparked criticism from users who feel it makes the model less competitive in the budget market. Despite the higher costs, Claude 3 Opus remains significantly more expensive at $15 per million input tokens and $75 per million output tokens. The AI community is reacting to the shift in pricing strategy, with some expressing concern over the model's affordability.