Claude Opus 5 (Max) vs Claude Opus 5 (High)
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5 (Max) by Anthropic or Claude Opus 5 (High) by Anthropic? 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 (Max) scores 2.7 points higher (50.8 vs 48.1) but costs 1.7× as much to run the benchmark ($7275 vs $4332; both flagship class). Pick Claude Opus 5 (Max) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Claude Opus 5 (High).
| Metric | Claude Opus 5 (Max) | Claude Opus 5 (High) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 50.8 | 48.1 | −5.3% Claude Opus 5 (High) is 5.3% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $7,274.74 | $4,331.68 | −40.5% Claude Opus 5 (High) is 40.5% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 50.36s | 20.99s | −58.3% Claude Opus 5 (High) is 58.3% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $5.00 / $25.0 | $5.00 / $25.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Claude Opus 5 (High) vs Claude Opus 5 (Max): 5.3% less intelligence, 40.5% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 58.3% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5 (Max) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) scores 56.00 for $4057.
- 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.
Claude Opus 5 (Max)Claude Opus 5 (High)Today'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/claude-opus-5-high · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5/claude-opus-5-high?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill