Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) vs Ling 3.1 Flash
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Ling 3.1 Flash by InclusionAI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallba… scores 10.1 points higher (51.2 vs 41.1) but costs 1.6× as much to run the benchmark ($1627 vs $1015; both premium class). Pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallba… when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Ling 3.1 Flash.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) | Ling 3.1 Flash | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 51.2 | 41.1 | −19.7% Ling 3.1 Flash is 19.7% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,626.81 | $1,014.56 | −37.6% Ling 3.1 Flash is 37.6% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 20.68s | 13.61s | −34.2% Ling 3.1 Flash is 34.2% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.30 / $0.90 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Ling 3.1 Flash vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback): 19.7% less intelligence, 37.6% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 34.2% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
- Ling 3.1 Flash is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
Claude Opus 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback)Ling 3.1 FlashToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
Compare something else
Agents:
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-medium/ling-3-1-flash · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-medium/ling-3-1-flash?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill