Anthropic Launches Claude Sonnet 4.6 With Opus-Level Performance

Key Takeaways

• Claude Sonnet 4.6 becomes the default model for Free and Pro users.
• Early testers preferred Sonnet 4.6 over its predecessor 70% of the time.
• The model introduces a 1M-token context window (beta), enhanced coding consistency and improved computer-use capabilities.

Anthropic's Claude Sonnet 4.6 arrives as the company's most capable mid-tier model, bringing frontier-level performance to enterprise automation at unchanged pricing. The company launched the upgrade on Feb. 17, 2026, with improvements spanning coding, computer use, long-context reasoning, agent planning, knowledge work and design capabilities.

Sonnet 4.6 is now the default for Free and Pro users on claude.ai and Claude Cowork. Pricing remains at $3/$15 per million tokens. A 1M token context window is available in beta.

In early testing, users preferred Sonnet 4.6 over its predecessor roughly 70% of the time. Users also preferred it to Claude Opus 4.5, the company's frontier model from November 2025, 59% of the time.

Table of Contents

• What’s New in Claude Sonnet 4.6
• Anthropic: Recent News & Initiatives
• Claude Code’s Impact on Developer Workflows
• Anthropic Background

What’s New in Claude Sonnet 4.6

Each improvement targets real-world enterprise workloads, from large codebases to multi-step automation.

Feature	How It Works
1M token context window	Holds entire codebases or research papers in single request (beta)
Enhanced coding	Improved consistency and instruction following
Computer use	Human-level capability on spreadsheets and multi-step web forms
Adaptive thinking	Extended reasoning support on Developer Platform
Context compaction	Auto-summarizes older context as conversations approach limits (beta)

Anthropic: Recent News & Initiatives

Anthropic experienced major growth through 2025 and into early 2026, securing three record-breaking funding rounds:

1. The company raised $3.5 billion in a Series E round in March 2025 at a $61.5 billion valuation.
2. Followed by a September 2025 Series F of $13 billion led by ICONIQ at a $183 billion valuation.
3. Most recently, Anthropic raised $30 billion in a Series G in February 2026 at a $380 billion valuation.

The company secured critical infrastructure through strategic partnerships. In October 2025, Anthropic inked a multi-billion dollar deal with Google for access to up to one million Tensor Processing Units. Google opened Workspace to Claude in April 2025, while Moody's partnered with Anthropic in October 2025.

Product releases accelerated through late 2025 and early 2026. The company launched a Claude Code Slack integration in December 2025 and Cowork in January 2026. In February of this year, Apple integrated the Claude Agent SDK into Xcode 26.3.

Claude Code’s Impact on Developer Workflows

Claude Code, which achieved over $2.5 billion in run-rate revenue, enables autonomous coding workflows through native IDE integration:

• Visual verification with interface design iteration
• Full project reasoning across file structures
• Autonomous task execution with independent file modification
• Model Context Protocol integration for CLI access

One analysis estimated that 4% of all GitHub public commits worldwide were authored by Claude Code.

API customer data revealed that businesses deploy Claude differently than individual users: 44% of API traffic handles computer or mathematical tasks, and 77% of API conversations are automated versus 12% augmented. These patterns reflect broader trends in AI agent deployments across enterprises.

Anthropic Background

Anthropic develops AI products for enterprise buyers with focus on safety and compliance. Founded in 2021 as a public benefit corporation, it serves financial services, life sciences, education and government sectors. The company's work intersects with broader developments in agentic AI and autonomous agents reshaping enterprise software.