Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) vs Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning)
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) by Kimi? 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 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… scores 29.0 points higher (56.0 vs 27.0) but costs 2.7× as much to run the benchmark ($4057 vs $1528; flagship vs premium cost classes). Pick Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallbac… when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning).
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) | Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 56.0 | 27.0 | −51.8% Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) is 51.8% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,056.65 | $1,528.20 | −62.3% Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) is 62.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 123.06s | 65.20s | −47.0% Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) is 47.0% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.95 / $4.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image, Video |
Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) vs Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback): 51.8% less intelligence, 62.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 47.0% 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.
- Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning) 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)Kimi K2.6 (Reasoning)Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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