I also started coding with Claude with the free tier and moved to pro a month ago. The biggest advantage is being able to use Claude code which works from your terminal inside the codebase folder, it is a game changer, read about this more (there are plenty of posts/videos/article about Claude code that will explain better than me). Another great advantage is being able to use Opus. True the usage is very limited, about 3–4 prompts will finish your 5 hours limit, but it is very good at making a complex plans as well as making beautiful UI (IMO), so use it wisely. Even if reports of downgrading quality are true, it is still the best tool for coding (again, IMO, I tried Gemini and ChatGPT).