ⓘ Mikhail Nilov / Pexels
Anthropic is removing Claude Haiku 4.5 from the model selector on October 29. The change affects the Free, Pro and Max plans in chat, Claude Cowork and Claude Design. Your old chats are kept, and Haiku 5.5 answers when you continue them. Here is who is exempt and what to check before the switch.
Anthropic is removing Claude Haiku 4.5 from the model selector in Claude. Starting October 29, the model will no longer appear in the menu where you pick a model for a chat. The company announced the change in a help article on October 15 and in an email to users. Claude Haiku 5.5 takes its place, and it has been available on the free plan since early October.
Free, Pro and Max users are affected
The change applies to the Free, Pro and Max plans. It covers regular chat, Claude Cowork and Claude Design, on the web as well as in the desktop and mobile apps. You can keep selecting Haiku 4.5 until October 29. After that date, it is gone from the list.
Team and Enterprise plans are exempt, and so is Claude Code. According to the help article, developers who use Haiku 4.5 through Anthropic’s API are not affected either.
What happens to your old chats
The help article states that "Your Haiku 4.5 chats stay in your account, and nothing is deleted." If you reopen one of those chats after October 29 and keep writing, Haiku 5.5 answers instead. You can also switch models at any point in a chat if you would rather use Sonnet or Opus for a specific question.
The switch matters most for people who built a fixed routine around Haiku 4.5, such as summaries or short translations. A newer model can phrase, shorten or ask follow-up questions differently when given the same instructions. Anthropic itself suggests trying Haiku 5.5 before the change.
How to prepare
Pick Haiku 5.5 in a new chat and give it a task you used to hand to Haiku 4.5. If the result works for you, there is nothing else to do. If it differs, check the instructions you saved in projects or style settings. Do this while both models are still available, because after October 29 you can no longer compare them directly.
I write about IT security and artificial intelligence. Cybersecurity is one of my regular topics, among others for Golem.de. At Notebookcheck, my focus is on practical AI for everyday users. I have worked hands-on with AI for years, most recently with a focus on AI agents and their use in everyday work, and I test tools and models myself rather than just reading about them.