Claude Opus 4.5 finally fixed my biggest frustration with AI assistants. I’ve been using AI assistants for about a year now, and I’ve noticed a pattern. They’re great at starting things. Drafting an email, brainstorming ideas, explaining a concept. But they tend to fall apart on longer, more complex work.
Ask them to help you plan a project or work through a detailed document, and somewhere around the 15-minute mark, they start forgetting what you talked about earlier. It’s like having a really smart coworker with short-term memory loss.
That’s been my main frustration with AI assistants. Until I tried Claude Opus 4.5.
I’m not going to pretend this is some magical upgrade that changes everything. But Claude Opus 4.5 genuinely fixed the specific problem that was driving me crazy. And the price dropped too, which was unexpected.
What Is Claude Opus 4.5?
If you’re not familiar, Claude is an AI assistant made by a company called Anthropic. It’s similar to ChatGPT. You type questions or requests, and it responds in conversational text. You can use it to write things, analyze documents, brainstorm, explain complex topics, or just talk through problems.
I use Claude more than ChatGPT these days, mostly because it feels a bit more thoughtful in its responses. Less eager to please, more willing to push back or say “actually, I’m not sure about that.” But that’s personal preference. Both are good tools. Claude Opus 4.5 is the newest, most capable version of Claude. It’s the “top of the line” model, meant for more serious work.
The Claude Opus 4.5 Memory Improvement
Let me explain the thing that frustrated me most about AI assistants before Claude Opus 4.5.
I was working on a presentation last month. I started by asking Claude to help me outline the structure, which it did really well. Then I asked it to help me flesh out the first section. But by the time I got to section four, something weird happened. It had forgotten the overall structure we’d agreed on. It started suggesting things that contradicted what we’d discussed twenty minutes earlier.
I had to keep re-explaining the context. “Remember, we decided this presentation is for non-technical executives.” “Remember, we’re focusing on three main points, not five.” It felt less like collaborating and more like managing someone who wasn’t paying attention.
Claude Opus 4.5 is noticeably better at this. Not perfect. I’ve still had it lose the thread occasionally. But the “memory” feels longer. I can work on something complex for an hour without constantly re-establishing context. That sounds like a small thing, but it changes how useful the tool is for real work.
What Improved in Claude Opus 4.5
Here’s what I’ve noticed after using Claude Opus 4.5 for a few weeks.
Longer conversations work. I can share a long document, discuss it for a while, then come back to specific details later in the conversation. Claude Opus 4.5 still knows what we’re talking about. Before, I’d have to paste the relevant sections again because it had effectively “forgotten” the document.
Fewer obvious mistakes. I used to catch Claude getting basic facts wrong maybe once per session. Simple stuff, like saying a product launched in 2022 when it was actually 2023. That still happens occasionally with Claude Opus 4.5, but less often. The errors I catch now are more subtle judgment calls.
The price dropped. This surprised me. Usually “new and improved” means “more expensive.” But Claude Opus 4.5 costs about half what the previous top-tier model cost. I don’t totally understand the pricing, but I’m not complaining.
Real Claude Opus 4.5 Example From My Week
I’ll give you a concrete example of how I used Claude Opus 4.5.
I had a mess of notes from several meetings about the same project. Probably 15 pages total across different documents. Normally, I’d have to organize those myself: read through everything, pull out the action items, figure out what decisions were made versus what was just discussed.
Instead, I pasted all the notes into Claude Opus 4.5 and asked it to create a summary. Not just any summary. I wanted action items organized by person, decisions that were finalized, and open questions that still needed answers.
It took maybe two minutes. And here’s the thing that impressed me: Claude Opus 4.5 caught a deadline that I had mentioned once, in passing, buried in the middle of page 9. The summary flagged it as “urgent action item: proposal due Friday.” I had completely forgotten about that deadline.
Watch: Claude Opus 4.5 in Action
Want to see how Claude Opus 4.5 actually works? This video walks through the experience:
Claude Opus 4.5 Limitations (Honest Review)
I don’t want to oversell this. Claude Opus 4.5 is still an AI assistant with real limitations.
It still makes things up. Just last week Claude Opus 4.5 confidently told me about a feature in a software product that doesn’t exist. It wasn’t lying. It genuinely seemed to believe the feature was real. Always verify anything factual that matters.
Technical questions are hit or miss. It still struggles with very specific, technical questions. If I ask about niche details in a specialized field, Claude Opus 4.5 often gives me a confident-sounding answer that’s actually generic or slightly off. For that kind of thing, I still need to consult actual experts or primary sources.
No real-time information. And it can’t browse the internet or access current information. Claude Opus 4.5 knows about things that happened before its training cutoff, but if I ask about something from last week, it doesn’t know.
Should You Try Claude Opus 4.5?
Depends on what you need.
If you only need quick tasks: If you only use AI assistants for quick questions like “what’s a good recipe for leftover chicken?” you probably won’t notice much difference. The free versions of Claude or ChatGPT are fine for that stuff.
If you need complex work: But if you’ve tried using AI for more substantial work and found it frustrating, if you’ve experienced that “wait, did you forget everything we just discussed?” moment, then Claude Opus 4.5 is worth trying. It’s not perfect, but it’s genuinely better for longer, more complex tasks.
How I use it: I’ve been using Claude Opus 4.5 for writing projects, meeting summaries, research organization, and working through complicated decisions. It’s become a pretty regular part of how I work. Not a replacement for thinking, but a useful tool that makes certain kinds of work less tedious.
You can try Claude Opus 4.5 at claude.ai. There’s a free tier with limited access, or you can pay for more usage. Anthropic also has a developer API if you want to build things with it.
Frequently Asked Questions
How is Claude Opus 4.5 different from ChatGPT? They’re similar tools from different companies (Anthropic vs OpenAI). In my experience, Claude Opus 4.5 tends to be more careful and nuanced, while ChatGPT is faster and more widely integrated into other apps. Try both and see which one clicks for you.
Is my data private with Claude Opus 4.5? By default, conversations may be used to improve the AI. You can opt out in settings. I wouldn’t paste anything truly confidential into Claude Opus 4.5 without checking my company’s policies first.
Do I need to be technical to use Claude Opus 4.5? Not at all. You just type what you want in plain English. If anything, Claude Opus 4.5 works better when you explain things naturally instead of trying to use “computer language.”
Related Reading
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How I Helped a Friend Escape To-Do List Hell – Using AI for task management and productivity.
If you’re new to AI tools, check out our Start Here page for a broader intro to what’s possible.
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