The title is misleading. The only thing they seem to have done was add a $100 plan identical to Claude's, which gives 5x usage of ChatGPT Plus. There is still a $200 plan that gives 20x usage.
r/codex is reporting that $20 (Plus) seems to have had its usage limit reduced (some people are saying it feels like 1/3 the previous limit now). The theory[1] is that reducing $20's limit lets them claim $200 has 20x $20's limit (and $100 has 10x).
If that's true, then the value comparison is not so positive for Codex any more
For my money, on the code side at least, GitHub Copilot on VSCode is still the most cost effective option, 10 bucks for 300 requests gets me all I need, especially when I use OpenAI models which are counted as 1x vs Opus which is 3x. I've stopped using all other tools like Claude Code etc.
5.4, in my own testing, was almost always ahead of Opus 4.6 for reviews and planning. I'm on plus plan on openai, so I couldn't test it so deeply. Anyone who had more experience on both could perhaps chime in? Pros/cons compared to Opus? I'm invested in Claude ecosystem but the recent quality and session limits decrease have me on the edge.
That has me quite tempted. In general, I stay under the Plus limits, but I do watch my consumption. I could use `/fast` mode all of the time, with extra high reasoning, and use gpt-5.4-pro for especially complex tasks. It wasn't worth 10x the price to me before, but 5x is approachable.
Very good move. In my experience, for system programming at least, GPT 5.4 xhigh is vastly superior to Claude Opus 4.6 max effort. I ran many brutal tests, including reconstructing for QEMU the SCSI controller (not longer accessible) of a SVSY UNIX of the early 90s used in a 386. Side by side, always re-mirroring the source trees each time one did a breakthrough in the implementation. Well, GPT 5.4 single handed did it all, while Opus continued to take wrong paths. The same for my Redis bug tracking and development. But 200$ is too much for many people (right now, at least: the reality is that if frontier LLMs are not democratized, we will end paying like a house rent to a few providers), and also while GPT 5.4 is much stronger, it is slower and less sharp when the thing to do is simple, so many people went for Claude (also because of better marketing and ethical concerns, even if my POV is different on that side: both companies sell LLM models with similar capabilities and similar internal IP protection and so forth, to me they look very similar in practical terms). This will surely change things, and many people will end with a Claude 5x account + a Codex 5x account I bet.
> I ran many brutal tests, including reconstructing for QEMU the SCSI controller (not longer accessible) of a SVSY UNIX of the early 90s used in a 386.
QEMU is one project that, for a variety of reasons, said that atm they simply refuse any code written by a LLM. Is this just as a test? Or just for you? Or do you think QEMU shall accept that patch?
> right now, at least: the reality is that if frontier LLMs are not democratized, we will end paying like a house rent to a few providers
This part of your comment has slipped through but is very worrying for me. I _think_ we're passing the point now where programmers are accepting that LLMs writing code are the real deal. Lots of antagonism along the way, but the reality is these things are good, and getting better all the time.
What this means in reality, in my opinion, is that if you're an independent programmer, or smaller company trying to compete with others to earn a living, you're almost certainly going to have to use coding agents, which means your competitiveness in the market is going to be gated by the big model providers until we have more options. If you somehow get banned from a few of them, which seems like it can happen through no fault of your own, you're going to be seriously negatively impacted.
That's quite worrying having gatekeepers to our industry where it was previously in our own hands.
I just checked the codex pricing page, it's pro 5x for $100, pro 20x for $200. The 20x plan has a codex usage boost until the end of may, whatever that means.
Edit: apparently the usage boost is an additional 2x for both 5x and 20x. So maybe it's time to start watching whichever of these services is currently doing offers like this and switch subscriptions every few months.
Really great to see this whole thread after so many questioning looks from people on why I use codex instead of Claude which generally doesn't work for me.
I never thought it was about particular usefulness for low level vs high level but it tracks with my general low level work.
They are actively exploiting the compute shortages of Anthropic. In our team we're pushing for more or less vanilla and portability, since the best harness today might not be the best one in 6 months.
For me it's not the price. It's the fact that they obviously read my prompts and may even use a derived version of my data for training. As it's very clear in the meantime that SAMA lies most of the time, there's just no way I can trust this company in any way.
It really feels like LLMs will mostly become tools for tech workers rather than the kind of civilization-level transformation sama has been peddling. Every single comment here seems to confirm the above.
Wouldn't put too much weight on HN comments boosting AI. Lots of brand new accounts, obvious LLM drivel ("it's not X, it's Y"). I just tried to reply to one to call out how overt it was and the comment was already killed, so they're definitely here.
It's interesting seeing all the ChatGPT users in this thread, knowing what we know about OpenAI. Either they don't care about what OpenAI does, don't know their reputation, or feel like their use is too insignificant to matter.
Absolutely not surprising. Just ask HN users what browser are they using and the answer will be Chrome or Chrome clone in 99% of cases. I even got a reply once along the lines "why do you use Firefox?". I was at a loss for words.
I also observe exact same pattern in two different countries among experienced IT workers. They mostly don't care at all about any non-tech implications of the services or employees they are using. Creepto, gambling, tax evasion, supporting monopolies, etc. - all fair game.
PS: I'm guilty of the same too, in other areas. But at least I'm selfaware about my transgressions.
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[ 3.2 ms ] story [ 61.8 ms ] threadAnd everyone serious uses the API rate billing anyway.
If that's true, then the value comparison is not so positive for Codex any more
[1] https://old.reddit.com/r/codex/comments/1sgxy71/so_did_they_...
5x=$100 20x=$200
For my money, on the code side at least, GitHub Copilot on VSCode is still the most cost effective option, 10 bucks for 300 requests gets me all I need, especially when I use OpenAI models which are counted as 1x vs Opus which is 3x. I've stopped using all other tools like Claude Code etc.
>Our existing $200 Pro tier still remains our highest usage option.
> I ran many brutal tests, including reconstructing for QEMU the SCSI controller (not longer accessible) of a SVSY UNIX of the early 90s used in a 386.
QEMU is one project that, for a variety of reasons, said that atm they simply refuse any code written by a LLM. Is this just as a test? Or just for you? Or do you think QEMU shall accept that patch?
This part of your comment has slipped through but is very worrying for me. I _think_ we're passing the point now where programmers are accepting that LLMs writing code are the real deal. Lots of antagonism along the way, but the reality is these things are good, and getting better all the time.
What this means in reality, in my opinion, is that if you're an independent programmer, or smaller company trying to compete with others to earn a living, you're almost certainly going to have to use coding agents, which means your competitiveness in the market is going to be gated by the big model providers until we have more options. If you somehow get banned from a few of them, which seems like it can happen through no fault of your own, you're going to be seriously negatively impacted.
That's quite worrying having gatekeepers to our industry where it was previously in our own hands.
Edit: apparently the usage boost is an additional 2x for both 5x and 20x. So maybe it's time to start watching whichever of these services is currently doing offers like this and switch subscriptions every few months.
I never thought it was about particular usefulness for low level vs high level but it tracks with my general low level work.
https://snipboard.io/jmGKfM.jpg
And I dont see open source development stopping either.
And that includes usage of the API with any agent without risking being banned. OpenAI is also very supportive of open source software.
I'm using GPT-5.4 with Swival (https://swival.dev) for a while, alongside local models, and it's absolutely fantastic.
All AI players are 50 shades of evil and are only concerned about their profits.
Instead of virtue signaling it's best to use the tools that work best for your needs.
I also observe exact same pattern in two different countries among experienced IT workers. They mostly don't care at all about any non-tech implications of the services or employees they are using. Creepto, gambling, tax evasion, supporting monopolies, etc. - all fair game.
PS: I'm guilty of the same too, in other areas. But at least I'm selfaware about my transgressions.
LE: Someone said this is how the tiers are now counted:
"Essentially if old plus is 1x then new limits are: Plus - 0.3x Pro $100 - 1.5x Pro $200 - 6x (unchanged)"