Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) vs Granite 4.2 8B
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Granite 4.2 8B 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 31.2 points higher (42.3 vs 11.1) but costs 16× as much to run the benchmark ($860 vs $53.1; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) when you need intelligence above 11.1, and Granite 4.2 8B when 11.1 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback) | Granite 4.2 8B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 42.3 | 11.1 | −73.8% Granite 4.2 8B is 73.8% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $860.33 | $53.07 | −93.8% Granite 4.2 8B is 93.8% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 13.42s | 39.25s | +192.5% Granite 4.2 8B is 192.5% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.06 / $0.25 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Granite 4.2 8B vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback): 73.8% less intelligence, 93.8% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 192.5% 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 8B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (High) scores 32.90 for $47.9.
Claude Opus 5.5 (Low, Default Fallback)Granite 4.2 8BToday'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-4-2-8b · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-low/granite-4-2-8b?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill