Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) vs Claude Opus 5 (Medium)
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Claude Opus 5 (Medium) by Anthropic? 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 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… scores 11.2 points higher (56.0 vs 44.8) but costs 1.5× as much to run the benchmark ($4057 vs $2732; both flagship class). Pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Claude Opus 5 (Medium).
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) | Claude Opus 5 (Medium) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 56.0 | 44.8 | −20.0% Claude Opus 5 (Medium) is 20.0% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,056.65 | $2,731.91 | −32.7% Claude Opus 5 (Medium) is 32.7% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 127.76s | 12.85s | −89.9% Claude Opus 5 (Medium) is 89.9% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $5.00 / $25.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Claude Opus 5 (Medium) vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback): 20.0% less intelligence, 32.7% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 89.9% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) is on today's frontier: nothing is both smarter and cheaper.
- Claude Opus 5 (Medium) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) scores 53.60 for $2172.
Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback)Claude Opus 5 (Medium)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
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