Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) vs Granite 4.2 3B
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Granite 4.2 3B by IBM? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-24.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) scores 33.2 points higher (42.3 vs 9.1) but costs 58× as much to run the benchmark ($860 vs $14.9; premium vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) when you need intelligence above 9.1, and Granite 4.2 3B when 9.1 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) | Granite 4.2 3B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 42.3 | 9.1 | −78.5% Granite 4.2 3B is 78.5% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $860.33 | $14.91 | −98.3% Granite 4.2 3B is 98.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 13.42s | 35.30s | +163.0% Granite 4.2 3B is 163.0% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.03 / $0.12 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Granite 4.2 3B vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback): 78.5% less intelligence, 98.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 163.0% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
- Granite 4.2 3B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Low) scores 21.50 for $10.6.
Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback)Granite 4.2 3BToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-low/granite-4-2-3b · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-low/granite-4-2-3b?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill