
What is Claude and how it can help you be more productive
|AI
Claude isn't just Anthropic's answer to ChatGPT anymore. What launched in March 2023 as a safety-focused assistant from a lab founded by ex-OpenAI researchers has grown into a full agentic platform: a conversational assistant, a terminal-based coding agent, a desktop coworker that reaches into your files, and a shared teammate inside Slack. In this guide we explain what Claude is in 2026, how the Opus 5.5, Fable 5.1, and Sonnet 5 family fits together, what Claude Code, Cowork, and Claude Tag can do, what the plans cost, and how to use Claude well.




