In the 2025 AI Advantage last year, token limits were barely talked about. Just in the past few weeks, Anthropic, the company that makes Claude AI, has introduced several new models and has adjusted they way they "tokenize" in the AI system, resulting in millions of complaints. The tokens on Claude's free plan are so severely limited now, it is pushing almost everyone except the most casual users onto their paid plans.
Despite all the complaints, Claude is a great AI tool (in my opinion, one of the best) and I asked it to make a BEGINNER FRIENDLY document to guide users on how to save their tokens and optimize their interactions with the AI.
I hope this saves you a lot of time, trouble, and tokens. If you are beginning to use AI please use this as a guideline on how to interact with AI chat models like Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini and so forth, the suggestions here apply to all AI models.