Anthropic has enhanced the free version of its Claude AI, seemingly aiming to attract users amid OpenAI's upcoming addition of advertisements to ChatGPT. The company announced on Wednesday that no-cost users can now generate documents, integrate with outside tools, apply specialized functions, and access additional capabilities.
The file-generation feature was first introduced for premium subscribers in September. As of now, those using the basic version of the AI assistant can generate and modify Excel sheets, PowerPoint slides, Word documents, and PDF files. These document-handling functions in Claude rely on the Sonnet 4.5 model.
In addition, the Connectors feature enables free users to integrate Claude with various external platforms. Supported options include services such as Canva, Slack, Notion, Zapier, and PayPal.
The Skills functionality allows users to train Claude for performing particular activities consistently over time. Essentially, it involves the AI accessing directories containing guidelines, code, and related materials for executing those activities. Further improvements to the no-cost plan encompass extended dialogue sessions, dynamic reply formats, and enhanced capabilities for voice and visual queries.
These enhancements to Claude's free access seem tailored to counter OpenAI's forthcoming ad rollout for ChatGPT's no-cost subscribers. Anthropic's recent update concluded with the slogan 'No ads in sight,' building on their assurance from the prior week to keep Claude without advertisements. The firm also satirized OpenAI's revenue pursuit in a Super Bowl commercial, which additionally mocked GPT-4o's tendency toward overly agreeable responses.