Uber exhausts 2026 AI budget in four months amid massive Claude Code adoption - Storyboard18

Ride-hailing platform Uber reportedly used up its entire 2026 artificial intelligence budget within the first four months of the year as adoption of Anthropic’s Claude Code tools surged across its engineering teams.

According to a Forbes report, Uber Chief Technology Officer Praveen Neppalli Naga told The Information that the company had to revisit its financial assumptions after spending exceeded projections much earlier than expected.

Uber introduced Claude Code to engineers in December 2025. Adoption accelerated quickly, with the report stating that 84 percent of engineers were classified as agentic coding users by March. It added that nearly 95 percent of Uber engineers used AI tools every month, while around 70 percent of committed code came from those systems.

The report said the company’s monthly AI-related spending per engineer ranged between $150 and $250 on average, while heavy users spent between $500 and $2,000. Naga reportedly said he personally spent $1,200 during a two-hour demo session.

Forbes also reported that Uber encouraged usage through internal leaderboards that ranked engineers based on Claude Code activity. The publication said the incentive structure contributed to faster token consumption and budget burn.

The development comes shortly after Anthropic announced changes to Claude’s pricing structure. On May 13, the company said paid Claude subscribers would face a separate monthly credit meter for agent tools and third-party harnesses starting June 15, billed at API rates.

The report noted that token-based pricing models are creating budgeting challenges for enterprises because costs vary significantly depending on how engineers use AI systems. Unlike flat per-seat pricing models, consumption-based billing can lead to unpredictable spending spikes.

It further said Uber is continuing to expand its AI push and plans to test OpenAI’s Codex alongside Claude Code as it explores broader use of AI agents in coding, testing and deployment workflows.

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