- Is Claude for Teachers free, and for how long?
- Who qualifies
- What's included
- Teacher account or district organisation?
- What a solo teacher account leaves out
- Setting it up for a whole school or district
- What happens to an existing teacher account
- Student information, training and deleting chats
- Where I'd start as a teacher
- Frequently asked questions
Yes, Claude for Teachers is free for verified US K-12 educators, either as an individual teacher account or through an organisation your school or district sets up. As of Nov 2026, Anthropic's help pages say qualifying teachers or organisations that sign up by June 30, 2027 get a full year of free access, and the offer is for educators only, not students.
It's one of the more generous education offers around, but the details matter: who counts as a teacher, what a solo account can't do, and who decides what you're allowed to put in about your students. Here's what Anthropic's own help pages say, in plain words.
Is Claude for Teachers free, and for how long?
The free part comes with a date attached. Anthropic's wording is "Sign up by June 30, 2027 for your full year of free access." That's a year of free access for teachers or organisations that sign up by that deadline. It's not a promise of free forever, so plan for a year and check Anthropic's page before you build your whole timetable around it.
Both routes are free: an individual teacher verifying with a school email, or a school or district setting up an organisation for everyone.
Who qualifies
The offer is for educators working in US K-12 schools and districts. Anthropic lists classroom teachers, instructional coaches, specialists, interventionists, librarians, counsellors and other certificated staff.
Students aren't part of it. Anthropic is clear that this is an educator-only offering and student accounts aren't included. If you're a student over 18, or you're using Claude outside your work as an educator, the Consumer Terms of Service apply instead. And if you work at a university, this isn't your offer: Claude for Education for universities is a separate product.
What's included
As of Nov 2026, Claude for Teachers includes Pro-level features, with Claude Code and Claude Cowork, plus:
- The Learning Commons connector, which gives Claude academic standards in all 50 states, the prerequisite skills beneath them and curriculum context.
- Teaching skills for lesson planning and differentiation, grounded in learning science.
- Education connectors from partners including MagicSchool, TeachFX and Canva for Education.
- FERPA-aligned protections and terms written for K-12.
Usage limits on an individual account are higher than a standard free account. Anthropic says that's enough for everyday classroom work like lesson planning, quizzes and parent communication. District members get the same rolling five-hour and weekly limits as an individual teacher account. If those limits are new to you, I've explained how Claude usage limits work in more detail.
Teacher account or district organisation?
This is the decision that matters most, because the two routes work differently once you're in.
| Individual teacher account | District organisation | |
|---|---|---|
| Who sets it up | You, verifying with a school email | An authorised administrator, applying with a school or district email |
| How you sign in | Your own Claude account | District single sign-on |
| Terms | You accept the K-12 terms yourself | The district accepts the K-12 terms and data processing agreement once for everyone |
| Who can read your chats | You control them and can delete them any time | The primary owner can turn on the Compliance API to read or delete any member's chats, files and projects |
| What's switched off | Several Team plan features (listed below) | Admins decide which features, models and connectors you can use; no connectors are on by default |
Public schools, districts and charter schools also accept the US K-12 Public Sector Addendum. Anthropic says it adapts the terms for public entities but doesn't change how student data is handled, and it doesn't apply to individual teacher accounts.
What a solo teacher account leaves out
When you verify as an individual, your account moves onto what Anthropic calls a free Claude for Teams plan for verified educators. You get educator terms, a data processing agreement and built-in student-data protections. But some Team plan features are turned off. You won't see:
- Billing and seat purchasing
- Member invitations and management
- Roles and permissions
- SSO and domain capture
- Spend controls
- Usage credits
- Premium seats
In practice, that means a solo account is for you alone. You can't invite the rest of your department into it. If you want colleagues working together with shared controls, that's what the district route is for.
Setting it up for a whole school or district
The person applying must be authorised to set up technology for the school or district and must use a school or district email. They'll need that email, a document showing their role such as an employee ID, access to the domain's DNS records and access to the identity provider. One rule trips people up: only one application can be open per email domain at a time, so agree inside the district who's applying before anyone starts.
- Apply and accept the K-12 terms. Go to the K-12 districts page on claude.ai, confirm you're authorised, and accept the US K-12 Terms of Service, Public Sector Addendum and Data Processing Agreement.
- Verify the school or district. Anthropic's partner Goodstack confirms your affiliation, and you'll get an email link to the new organisation once approved.
- Verify the email domain. Add the district's email domain, publish the DNS TXT record shown and click Verify. Seats open and the free first-year plan applies automatically.
- Set up SSO and automatic account creation. Connect the identity provider, turn on Require SSO, turn on just-in-time or SCIM provisioning, and turn on Restrict organization creation so district emails can't create personal Claude accounts.
- Bring teachers in. Click Migrate accounts to start a 30-day window for existing accounts on the domain.
Once automatic account creation is on, email invitations are disabled. Teachers who join later just sign in with SSO and land in the organisation.
What happens to an existing teacher account
This is the part a teacher who signed up early needs to know. When the district starts Migrate accounts, every existing Claude account on the domain, including individual Claude for Teachers accounts, gets notified. Each person chooses to move everything across, start over or do nothing. If you do nothing, the account closes at the deadline, though the data's kept so Support can recover it.
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And once the district has verified its email domain, new personal Claude accounts can't be created with a district email address. If you sign up alone today and your district joins next term, expect to make that choice.
Student information, training and deleting chats
Anthropic says it won't use your inputs or outputs to train its models. You keep the rights to what you put in and own what comes out. You're the Controller of the data, and Anthropic acts as the Processor, handling it only to provide the service. It doesn't sell or share student data, use it for advertising or build profiles of students, and it doesn't collect data directly from students.
The line every teacher should read twice: Claude for Teachers provides a FERPA-configured setting, but whether and how identifiable student information may be used is decided by your school or district's policies, not by Anthropic. If you're on an individual account and haven't had school or district authorisation, Anthropic says don't include identifiable student information.
On security, Anthropic lists AES-256 encryption at rest, TLS 1.2 or better in transit, multi-factor authentication, annual third-party audits and SOC 2 certification at its Trust Center. You can delete your chats any time, district admins can delete any member's data through the Compliance API, and if a district leaves, Anthropic returns its data on request and deletes its copies within 30 days, except where the law requires retention.
Where I'd start as a teacher
I'd check whether my district is already setting up an organisation before signing up alone, because the migration window and the one-application rule mean you may have to move across later anyway. And I'd skip putting any student names, grades or notes in until the school has said yes in writing. Lesson plans, quizzes and parent letters with no names in them are an easy place to begin. When you want ideas for what to ask, my Claude prompts library is a good starting point.
As of Nov 2026 this offer is new and the details may move, so check Anthropic's own help pages for the latest before you sign up.
If your school or training team wants to use Claude with clear rules everyone understands, that's the kind of AI enablement I help with. I run AI training and workshops for teams, and help businesses with AI enablement and workflow automation, so the busywork runs itself and people get time back. Most of that work is with SaaS marketing teams and small businesses. Here's how we can work together.
Frequently asked questions
Is Claude free for teachers?
Yes, for verified US K-12 educators. As of Nov 2026, teachers or organisations that sign up by June 30, 2027 get a full year of free access.
Can students use Claude for Teachers?
No. Anthropic says it's an educator-only offering and student accounts aren't part of it.
Does Anthropic train on Claude for Teachers chats?
No. Anthropic says it won't use your inputs or outputs to train its models.
Can I put student names into Claude for Teachers?
Only if your school or district's policy allows it. On an individual account without school or district authorisation, Anthropic says don't include identifiable student information.
What happens to my account if my district joins later?
The district can start a 30-day Migrate accounts window. You choose to move everything, start over or do nothing; if you do nothing, the account closes at the deadline and Support can recover the data.
