Two pricing stories this week that are directly relevant if you use AI tools for business: Anthropic reversed an expected cost increase, while DeepSeek moved in the opposite direction. Here is exactly what is changing and what you should do about it.
Anthropic permanently freezes the Sonnet 5 price
When Anthropic launched Claude Sonnet 2026 in June 5, the company explicitly described the price of $2 per million input tokens and $10 per million output tokens as an introductory price, valid until 31 August 2026. From 1 September, the price would rise to $3/$15 per million tokens, an increase of 50%.
That increase is not going ahead. On 10 August 2026, Anthropic announced that the introductory price will become the standard price. The official pricing documentation now reads: "The $2/$10 per million input/output token pricing for Claude Sonnet 5, announced at launch as introductory pricing through August 31, 2026, is now the standard price."
For organisations using Sonnet 5 via the API, this means the fourth-quarter budget can simply be based on current rates. For comparison, the previous generation, Claude Sonnet 4.6, costs $3/$15 per million tokens, so Sonnet 5 is not only more capable but also cheaper than its predecessor.
What remains unchanged: the price for Claude Opus 5 ($5/$25 per million tokens) and the higher-tier models Fable 5 and Mythos 5 (both $10/$50). Want to know which Claude variant best suits your use? See the model overview on betin-xt.com.
DeepSeek raises API prices after overwhelming demand
Contrary news from DeepSeek. In early August, the Chinese AI company had already warned developers of upcoming price increases, but without concrete figures. On 13 August, the new rates were revealed: the increases range from 50% to 1,100%, depending on the model, the token type and the time of use.
The trigger: DeepSeek V4 Flash, then priced at $0.14 per million input tokens, attracted so many users that the available computing capacity became overloaded. The company is also introducing peak and off-peak rates for V4 Pro and V4 Flash: usage outside peak times is cheaper, while usage at peak times costs more than the standard hourly rate.
For teams that chose DeepSeek because of its low price, this is a moment to recalculate the bill. The GDPR dimension also plays a role: the DeepSeek cloud API processes data on servers in China. There is no EU adequacy decision for China, and DeepSeek has not published Standard Contractual Clauses. For processing personal data, the direct API is therefore not defensible under the GDPR, use an EU-hosted variant instead (such as via Microsoft Azure AI Foundry), or self-host on EU infrastructure using the open weights. See our safety overview for the full GDPR profile per model.
What does this do to the price relationships?
A brief overview of the most widely used mid-tier models, now that the dust is settling:
| Model | Input ($/MTok) | Output ($/MTok) | EU hosting |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Sonnet 5 | $2,00 | $10,00 | Yes (EU region option) |
| Claude Sonnet 4.6 | $3,00 | $15,00 | Yes |
| GPT-5.4 mini | $0,75 | $4,50 | Yes (Azure EU) |
| DeepSeek V4 Flash (new) | increased* | increased* | No (China) |
*Exact new DeepSeek rates vary by peak/off-peak period and model; consult the DeepSeek pricing page for current figures.
For Dutch organisations in regulated sectors, such as healthcare, finance and legal, the combination of price certainty and EU hosting with Claude Sonnet 5 is a practical advantage. Also see the sector pages on betin-xt.com for a comparison by sector.
What to do
- Are you using Sonnet 5? No action needed, your current pricing arrangements simply continue.
- Are you using DeepSeek V4 Flash or V4 Pro? Check the new rates on your next invoice and compare with alternatives if costs rise sharply.
- Are you processing personal data via the DeepSeek API? Stop doing so and switch to a GDPR-defensible alternative; the Chinese server location without SCCs is a GDPR risk.
Sources: Anthropic – pricing documentation · Dataconomy NL – DeepSeek price warning · US News – DeepSeek raises V4 prices · Emerce – DeepSeek price increase