Claude guest pass: 7 free days of Pro, only if you never paid for or trialled Claude

What is a Claude guest pass?

A Claude guest pass is Anthropic's referral program, and the free week covers more than chat. Anthropic's help article says it's Pro, "which includes Claude Code, Cowork, and Claude Design". The sender earns overage credits only "once your referee converts to a paid user."

Two Anthropic pages set the rules, and they don't match. We read both on 9 November 2026: the help article, "Updated over a week ago", and the Guest Pass Terms, effective 5 November 2026. Rule by rule:

Where the two conflict, the terms are the contract. The terms page took effect on 5 November, so it's the newer of the two, and it spells out rules that the help article doesn't mention at all. So plan on the stricter rule: 31 days for senders, and no pass for anyone who ever had a Claude trial.

Who can send a Claude guest pass?

Pro and Max subscribers who have paid for at least 31 days can send passes, under the terms of 5 November 2026. The help article also names Ultra, the $200 plan Anthropic's pricing page lists above Max. The terms don't mention it. An Ultra subscriber should check their own settings before promising a friend a pass.

Senders find their passes in four places, per the help article:

1. Type /passes in Claude Code.
2. Open Claude settings and look under "Claude Code".
3. Open the Cowork tab in Claude Desktop's settings.
4. Open Claude Design's settings.

Each place also shows which links have been redeemed. Anthropic doesn't publish how many passes a sender gets. The help article says only that there's a limited number, and that passes can expire or be withdrawn. Once they're used or expired, you can't send more.

Anthropic doesn't explain the message "Guest passes are not currently available". Under its own rules, the likely causes are no passes left or no eligibility yet, such as a new subscriber inside the 31 day wait. It isn't always that. A Max 20x subscriber reported the message as a bug on 26 June 2026, with the plan shown correctly. A bot closed the report in August for inactivity, with no fix noted.

Who can redeem a Claude guest pass?

Only someone who has never paid for Claude and never had a Claude free trial. The terms define eligible guests as people who never had "a paid subscription to, or free trial of, any Claude product", including through Team or Enterprise plans. That's stricter than the help article's "new to Claude paid subscriptions".

So three groups are out. Anyone who once paid for Pro is out. So is anyone who used an earlier guest pass, and anyone whose job gave them a Team seat. A Free account that never paid is fine.

The terms also cap it at "one per person and per account." Anthropic can revoke passes and suspend accounts for self-referral or for creating multiple accounts. A fresh email doesn't make you a new guest. Families can't stretch one pass or one plan across the house either: what Claude costs a household prices each adult's own plan.

How do you redeem a guest pass, step by step?

You open the sender's link on an eligible account, pick Pro and add a card. Here's the order, with the two places it goes wrong:

1. Get a link from a friend on Pro or Max who still has a pass. Links are first come, first served, so a link posted in public can run dry fast.
2. Open it while signed in to an account that has never paid for or trialled Claude.
3. Choose Pro. Under the terms, a guest who picks a plan with no trial, such as Max at $100 a month, "will be charged the standard price for that plan at checkout", and the sender still loses a pass.
4. Add a card. Anthropic's offer terms say it won't charge during the trial, "though we may place a temporary authorization hold to verify it."
5. Decide before day 7. If you do nothing, Pro renews at $20 a month on the web.

Cancelling during the trial costs nothing. The offer terms say "If you cancel during the Offer Period, you'll keep access to the Offer Plan until the Offer Period ends." On the web, that's in Settings > Billing. After the first $20 charge, the same terms call amounts charged under the offer "non-refundable".

What does the sender get from a Claude referral?

The sender gets credit only when the guest becomes a paying subscriber, and Anthropic doesn't publish the amount. The help article calls it overage credits. The terms call it a Reward and say nobody earns one when a pass is redeemed or a trial starts. A guest who cancels during the free week earns the sender nothing.

Expiry splits the pages. The help article says "The credits expire one year from the date of issuance." The terms say promotional credit "expires 90 days from the date it is issued" by default, unless the offer says otherwise. Both agree the credit dies if the sender drops to Free, and the terms add cancelling to that. If you send passes for the credit, spend it within 90 days to be safe.

Anthropic can also cap the total, hold a reward back while it runs a fraud review, add a waiting period in the offer, or end the whole program at any time. Ending it doesn't touch trials already started, per the terms.

What if you can't get a Claude guest pass?

Then no free Pro route is open to most people. Anthropic's pricing page lists no trial for Pro, gift subscriptions are paused, and institutional offers need a school or company. Claude Pro free trial checks every route, and the free plan stays the way to try Claude with no card at all.

Whizi, which publishes this page, sells the last row. It's a paid week, not a free one, and it isn't Claude Pro. There's no Claude Code, Cowork or Claude Design, and 30 Opus messages is a sample, not a working week. A guest pass beats it if a friend has one to spare. Whizi fits the person who can't get one, or who has already used their Claude trial, and wants to test Claude next to GPT. The cheapest way to use Claude and GPT prices the longer run.