For months, engineers in Silicon Valley have been quietly talking about Claude Code. At first, it sounded like the usual excitement around a new developer tool. Lately, though, the tone has shifted. The chatter feels steadier, more confident, and less speculative.

Claude Code is Anthropic’s AI-powered coding tool, and inside the company, it has become hard to ignore.

People who work there describe it less as a product demo and more as part of their daily workflow. Engineers use it to write features, fix bugs, and move between tasks faster than they used to. Sales teams use it too. What started as an experiment has turned into something closer to infrastructure.

That change did not happen overnight.

From autocomplete to agents

AI coding tools have been around for years, but for a long time they felt limited. Early versions mostly acted like autocomplete, suggesting small snippets of code while developers typed. Helpful, but easy to ignore.

Claude Code arrived as the industry was starting to move past that phase. Instead of waiting for instructions line by line, the tool was designed to work more independently. Developers could describe what they wanted in plain language and let the system handle larger chunks of the work.

Early versions were rough. They made mistakes. They got stuck. Sometimes they cost more to run than they were worth. Inside Anthropic, that was not a surprise. The team built Claude Code with the assumption that AI models would improve quickly, even if the product lagged at first.

That bet seems to be paying off.

Recent model upgrades have made the tool more reliable, especially for experienced engineers who know how to supervise it. Several developers say the difference over the past few months has been noticeable. Tasks that once felt risky to hand off now feel routine.

A tool the company actually uses

One reason Claude Code has gained traction is simple. Anthropic employees use it themselves.

Inside the company, Claude Code is not treated like a side project. Engineers rely on it daily. Teams expect it to be part of how work gets done. When something breaks, the feedback loop is short, because the people building the tool are also the ones depending on it.

This kind of internal adoption shapes priorities. Features that slow people down get fixed. Interfaces that confuse users get simplified. The goal is not to impress outsiders but to make the tool usable at scale.

That focus has started to show up in the numbers. Claude Code has grown into one of Anthropic’s fastest-expanding products, contributing a meaningful share of the company’s revenue. While enterprise AI systems remain the core business, coding tools have become harder to dismiss as a niche.

Momentum beyond coding

Anthropic is now trying to apply the same approach elsewhere.

The company has begun experimenting with agents designed for non-coding tasks, tools that can manage files, move data between applications, and handle routine office work. The idea is similar to Claude Code but aimed at people who never open a terminal.

It is still early. Even inside Anthropic, there is uncertainty about how these tools will be used long-term. But the company seems willing to let that play out slowly, rather than forcing a clear narrative too soon.

That restraint is notable in an industry that often rushes to promise transformation before products are ready.

A quieter shift in how work gets done

What stands out about Claude Code is not a single breakthrough feature. It is the way it changes the rhythm of work.

Engineers describe jumping between tasks, starting multiple agents at once, and checking in on them as they go. Focus looks different. Productivity looks messier but also more fluid. The work still needs supervision, but less hands-on effort.

This is not the end of programming, and Anthropic is not claiming it is. Instead, Claude Code fits into a long pattern of abstraction in software development. Each step removes some friction and introduces new questions about skill, control, and trust.

For now, the change is subtle. Claude Code is not rewriting the rules of software overnight. It is doing something quieter.

It is becoming normal. And inside Anthropic, that may be the most important shift of all.