First token counts reveal Opus 4.7 costs significantly more than 4.6 despite Anthropic's flat pricing

The real issue isn't the tokenizer itself — it's the timing. Anthropic is effectively raising costs for its most commercially active user base, Claude Code developers, without calling it a price increase, at the exact moment that base has a credible alternative to defect to.

OpenAI's upgraded Codex, covered here from The Verge and TechCrunch on April 16, was already framed as a direct shot at Claude Code's market position. A hidden cost increase of up to 47% hands OpenAI a concrete, quantifiable talking point in that competition. Separately, the 'tokenmaxxing' coverage from TechCrunch on April 17 noted that developers are already struggling to reason clearly about token costs and productivity tradeoffs. Adding a tokenizer-driven multiplier to that confusion compounds the problem for teams trying to budget Claude Code usage. Anthropic's London expansion signals long-term confidence, but none of that matters if developers quietly reprice their toolchain decisions in the next billing cycle.

Watch whether Claude Code's share of developer tooling surveys shifts in Q2 2026 benchmarks like the Stack Overflow Developer Survey or similar. If Codex adoption numbers rise while this pricing story circulates, the cost delta will have done measurable competitive damage.