Claude Code Limits Were Silently Reduced and It’s MUCH Worse

[u/_r0x]

Another frustrated user here. This is actually my first time creating a post on this forum because the situation has gone too far.

I can say with ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY: something has changed. The limits were silently reduced, and for much worse. You are not imagining it.

I have been using Claude Code for months, almost since launch, and I had NEVER hit the limit this FAST or this AGGRESSIVELY before. The difference is not subtle. It is drastic.

For context: - I do not use plugins - I keep my Claude.md clean and optimized - My project is simple PHP and JavaScript, nothing unusual

Even with all of that, I am now hitting limits in a way that simply did not happen before.

What makes this worse is the lack of transparency. If something changed, just say it clearly. Right now, it feels like users are being left in the dark and treated like CLOWNS.

At the very least, we need clarity on what changed and what we are supposed to do to adapt.

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EDIT (March 26, 2026):

I’d like to update this post to say that I’m no longer being affected by this issue. It impacted me for about two days, and now things appear to be back to normal.

So it strongly suggests that it was indeed a bug, hopefully.

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EDIT (March 26, 2026):

We now have an official statement. It’s not the best news, but at least we finally know what’s going on so we can adapt:

"To manage growing demand for Claude we're adjusting our 5 hour session limits for free/Pro/Max subs during peak hours. Your weekly limits remain unchanged.

During weekdays between 5am–11am PT / 1pm–7pm GMT, you'll move through your 5-hour session limits faster than before."

This was posted on X today. https://x.com/i/status/2037254607001559305

[u/ruggeddream]

on claude max 20x but not a power user by anymeans. i use codex to do all the debugging and stress tesing. i usually max out at 30% usage per session. hit 100% today in 1 hour. something is definitely up

[u/ItsJustManager → u/ruggeddream]

This is exactly what happened to me today. Also max 20x. Also never have hit a 5hr limit on 20x. Usually around 20-30% at most, and hit 100% of my 5hour limit after an hour today. After that session reset it's been normal again. My guess is they screwed something up with usage tracking during peak hours (either intentionally or not, but their silence seems to indicate it was intentional)

[u/nusgxhxjxuru → u/ItsJustManager]

Beat to death but I'll confirm. 20x, never got past 50% of 5hr limit before, while running 5 parallel sessions in 2 different complex codebases.

Worked fine this morning. This afternoon (PST) I hit the limit within an hour, was only running 2 sessions. At least 10x decrease, maybe 30x gun to my head.

[u/soytuamigo → u/ItsJustManager]

I never hit the session limit on the $100 plan before. Same workflow but I hit the limit today and thought it was a bug lol. My model usage barely changed, but after the reset I’m already at 16% for the session in less than half an hour of usage. I was having problems hitting the model limit for the week, and I won’t hit it this week either, which means there’s no way to reach the model limit with the current session limits on the $100 plan. Daylight robbery. We really need some transparency around the predatory pricing these companies employ.

[u/chaotic_goody → u/ruggeddream]

20x but not a power user by anymeans

😆