Claude is gaining paid consumers, narrowing the gap with ChatGPT

Credit card transaction analysis from Indagari shows consumers who pay for AI are increasingly choosing Anthropic’s Claude. Indagari examines billions of anonymized transactions from about 28 million U.S. consumers; its weekly data runs from 2025 through May 10, 2026 and includes payments such as subscriptions and API tokens.

The dataset reveals Claude’s paying consumer base and revenue rising month by month, up roughly 75% since January 2026 among that sample. Growth persisted even after a March spike tied to Anthropic’s decision to block use of its models by the Trump administration for mass surveillance of Americans and autonomous weapons.

Interest on consumer platforms has climbed as well. DataCamp says “Claude” is now the most searched term on its site, ahead of “AI,” and that self-directed learners demand Claude courses three to one over ChatGPT; course interest in Claude jumped 18x in the last 30 days.

United States

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