Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) vs GPT-5.6 Sol (High)
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or GPT-5.6 Sol (High) by OpenAI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-26.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… scores 13.7 points higher (56.0 vs 42.3) but costs 2.7× as much to run the benchmark ($4057 vs $1487; flagship vs premium cost classes). Pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise GPT-5.6 Sol (High).
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) | GPT-5.6 Sol (High) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 56.0 | 42.3 | −24.5% GPT-5.6 Sol (High) is 24.5% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,056.65 | $1,487.34 | −63.3% GPT-5.6 Sol (High) is 63.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 127.77s | 15.89s | −87.6% GPT-5.6 Sol (High) is 87.6% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $4.00 / $20.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
GPT-5.6 Sol (High) vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback): 24.5% less intelligence, 63.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 87.6% 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.
- GPT-5.6 Sol (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback)GPT-5.6 Sol (High)Today's Pareto 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-xhigh/gpt-5-6-sol-high · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-5-xhigh/gpt-5-6-sol-high?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill