Claude Opus 5 (Medium) vs Beam 1.0
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5 (Medium) by Anthropic or Beam 1.0 by Reflection? 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 (Medium) scores 14.5 points higher (44.8 vs 30.3) but costs 8.6× as much to run the benchmark ($2732 vs $319; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Opus 5 (Medium) when you need intelligence above 30.3, and Beam 1.0 when 30.3 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5 (Medium) | Beam 1.0 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 44.8 | 30.3 | −32.4% Beam 1.0 is 32.4% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $2,731.91 | $318.73 | −88.3% Beam 1.0 is 88.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 13.14s | 8.02s | −39.0% Beam 1.0 is 39.0% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $5.00 / $25.0 | $0.40 / $1.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Beam 1.0 vs Claude Opus 5 (Medium): 32.4% less intelligence, 88.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 39.0% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- 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.
- Beam 1.0 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
Claude Opus 5 (Medium)Beam 1.0Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights 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-medium/reflection-beam · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-medium/reflection-beam?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill