Anthropic is giving startups a free year of Claude Team and $1,000 in credits

Anthropic announced on Tuesday an expansion of its Claude for Startups program, offering subsidized access to its AI models and other benefits to qualifying companies. The announcement was made as part of Anthropic's SF Tech Week event.

The new version of the program provides a free year of Claude Team, Anthropic's paid plan for groups, with up to five premium seats, along with $1,000 in API credits for building with Claude. Companies will also get access to Claude Marketplace, which lets them build plug-ins for the service, and can book virtual office hours with Anthropic's Applied AI team.

In its announcement, Anthropic said: "We created this program because we believe the benefits of AI will reach most people through the companies that build on top of models, rather than through the models alone." The company added that this "makes partnering closely with founders and developers central to our mission."

Companies are eligible if they were founded in the last five years or received funding in the last two years. Interested companies can apply through the Claude for Startups program page.