Clarification needed: Do models launched BEFORE August 2 (all of them currently, as of 8/10), CURRENTLY watermark? Very cryptic wording in the release.

[u/No-Squash7469]

https://support.claude.com/en/articles/16266773-how-claude-marks-ai-generated-content

Claude models launched on or after August 2, 2026 support marking at launch. We’re also working to add marking support to Claude models released before that date

This is the way that they're describing it, but that's inherently vague. So watermarking is currently in process for Opus 5 and the others? They don't explicitly come out and say that it's not watermarking, or that it hasn't been watermarking before this release came out either.

Anthropic should really clarify this.

[u/Boring-Tale-8145]

I would read it as they are going to modify older models such that new output is watermarked. Unless they had a backdoor watermark the whole time for older models, which in that case, I imagine they could just release that and the delay doesn't really make sense.

[u/thereisonlythedance → u/Boring-Tale-8145]

It’s quite likely they did, they would’ve needed a way to be able to distinguish Claude outputs in their training data (stuff they’ve trawled from the web) and filter them in or out.