Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) vs DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (Non-reasoning)
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (Non-reasoning) by DeepSeek? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-26.
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… scores 31.3 points higher (56.0 vs 24.7) but costs 21× as much to run the benchmark ($4057 vs $194; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… when you need intelligence above 24.7, and DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (Non-reasoning) when 24.7 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) | DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (Non-reasoning) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 56.0 | 24.7 | −55.9% DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (… is 55.9% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,056.65 | $193.84 | −95.2% DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (… is 95.2% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 127.77s | 2.91s | −97.7% DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (… is 97.7% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.30 / $1.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (Non-reasoning) vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback): 55.9% less intelligence, 95.2% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 97.7% faster end-to-end.
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) is on today's frontier: nothing is both smarter and cheaper.
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (Non-reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Terra (Medium) scores 41.30 for $175.
Compare something else
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-xhigh/deepseek-v4-1-flash-non-reasoning · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-xhigh/deepseek-v4-1-flash-non-reasoning?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill