Claude Opus 5 (High) vs Qwen3.8 Max
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5 (High) by Anthropic or Qwen3.8 Max by Alibaba? 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 (High) scores 7.9 points higher (48.1 vs 40.2) but costs 1.4× as much to run the benchmark ($4332 vs $3172; both flagship class). Pick Claude Opus 5 (High) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Qwen3.8 Max.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5 (High) | Qwen3.8 Max | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 48.1 | 40.2 | −16.4% Qwen3.8 Max is 16.4% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,331.68 | $3,172.37 | −26.8% Qwen3.8 Max is 26.8% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 26.50s | 64.37s | +142.9% Qwen3.8 Max is 142.9% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $5.00 / $25.0 | $2.00 / $6.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8 Max vs Claude Opus 5 (High): 16.4% less intelligence, 26.8% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 142.9% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5 (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) scores 56.00 for $4057.
- Qwen3.8 Max is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Kimi K3.1 Pro scores 55.10 for $3117.
Claude Opus 5 (High)Qwen3.8 MaxToday's Pareto frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-high/qwen3-8-max-0803 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-high/qwen3-8-max-0803?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill