Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning) vs Qwen3 Coder Next
Which is better for the money: Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning) by Anthropic or Qwen3 Coder Next by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-07-17.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning) scores 15.3 points higher (36.4 vs 21.1) but costs 4.6× as much to run the benchmark ($1133 vs $247; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning) when you need intelligence above 21.1, and Qwen3 Coder Next when 21.1 is enough.
| Metric | Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning) | Qwen3 Coder Next | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 36.4 | 21.1 | −42.0% Qwen3 Coder Next is 42.0% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,132.85 | $247.26 | −78.2% Qwen3 Coder Next is 78.2% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 23.10s | 6.61s | −71.4% Qwen3 Coder Next is 71.4% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $3.00 / $15.0 | $0.35 / $1.20 | |
| Input modalities | Not reported | Not reported |
Qwen3 Coder Next vs Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning): 42.0% less intelligence, 78.2% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 71.4% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-5.6 Sol (high) scores 55.90 for $956.
- Qwen3 Coder Next is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-5.6 Terra (medium) scores 45.60 for $240.
Claude 4.5 Sonnet (Reasoning)Qwen3 Coder NextToday's Pareto frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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