Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max) vs DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High)
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max) by Anthropic or DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High) by DeepSeek? 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 Sonnet 4.6 (Max) scores 5.7 points higher (30.1 vs 24.4) but costs 41× as much to run the benchmark ($4925 vs $121; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max) when you need intelligence above 24.4, and DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High) when 24.4 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max) | DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 30.1 | 24.4 | −18.9% DeepSeek V4 Flash 042… is 18.9% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,924.80 | $121.20 | −97.5% DeepSeek V4 Flash 042… is 97.5% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 115.26s | Not reported | — not comparable |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $3.00 / $15.0 | $0.11 / $0.23 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High) vs Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max): 18.9% less intelligence, 97.5% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and end-to-end time not fully reported.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) scores 56.00 for $4057.
- DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Flash scores 37.90 for $110.
Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Max)DeepSeek V4 Flash 0420 (High)Today'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-sonnet-4-6-adaptive/deepseek-v4-flash-0420-high · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-sonnet-4-6-adaptive/deepseek-v4-flash-0420-high?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill