Anthropic has rolled out a new Fast mode for Claude Opus 4.6, aiming to cut latency for developers working on time-sensitive coding tasks. The company says Fast mode can deliver responses up to 2.5 times faster, and it’s available today in Claude Code for developers with extra usage enabled, while API access is being offered as a limited research preview through the Claude Developer Platform via a waitlist.
The pitch is straightforward: keep the same coding workflow, but reduce the waiting around. Anthropic is positioning Fast mode for high-intensity development moments—debugging sessions, large codebase reviews, complex script generation, and multi-step technical queries—where turnaround time can be the difference between smooth iteration and stalled momentum.
Availability is intentionally staggered. Anthropic says internal teams have already been using the accelerated experience, and external access is expanding gradually. On the product side, Claude Code users with extra usage enabled can turn on Fast mode now. On the platform side, Anthropic is treating Fast mode for Opus 4.6 in the API as a research preview, limiting access while it gathers feedback.
Anthropic also acknowledges the tradeoff on its end: Fast mode requires more compute and comes with higher operational cost. The company’s bet is that the productivity upside—especially for professional developers and enterprise teams—justifies offering a higher-cost, higher-speed option for the moments when latency matters most.
Fast mode arrives alongside broader improvements in Claude Opus 4.6 that aren’t just about speed. Anthropic says the model is better at handling longer conversations and large documents, with stronger context retention during extended coding sessions. The company also highlights upgrades to planning, long-form reasoning, and error detection during code reviews—features designed for real development work that spans multiple files and longer logic chains.
Taken together, the update underscores Anthropic’s push to make Claude Code feel more viable as an everyday developer tool: not only smarter in longer sessions, but faster when teams are working under deadline pressure.
This analysis is based on reporting from The Times of India.
Image courtesy of Anthropic.
This article was generated with AI assistance and reviewed for accuracy and quality.
