Claude Fable 5.2 (Medium, Default Fallback) vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback)
Which is better for the money: Claude Fable 5.2 (Medium, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) by Anthropic? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-11-10.
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) scores 2.7 points higher (59.1 vs 56.4) but costs 2.7× as much to run the benchmark ($8910 vs $3360; both flagship class). Pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Claude Fable 5.2 (Medium, Default Fallb….
| Metric | Claude Fable 5.2 (Medium, Default Fallback) | Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 56.4 | 59.1 | +4.8% Claude Opus 5.5 (Max,… is 4.8% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $3,359.66 | $8,909.67 | +165.2% Claude Opus 5.5 (Max,… is 2.7× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 28.35s | 665.17s | +2246.3% Claude Opus 5.5 (Max,… is 2246.3% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $8.00 / $40.0 | $4.00 / $20.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) vs Claude Fable 5.2 (Medium, Default Fallback): 4.8% more intelligence, 165.2% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 2246.3% slower end-to-end.
Against the frontier
- Claude Fable 5.2 (Medium, Default Fallback) is on today's frontier: nothing is both smarter and cheaper.
- Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Fable 5.2 (High, Default Fallback) scores 61.80 for $7106.
Compare something else
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-fable-5-2-medium/claude-opus-5-5 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-fable-5-2-medium/claude-opus-5-5?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill