Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) vs GLM-5.3-Flash
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or GLM-5.3-Flash by Z AI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallba… scores 5.0 points higher (46.8 vs 41.8) but costs 3.4× as much to run the benchmark ($1027 vs $306; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallba… when you need intelligence above 41.8, and GLM-5.3-Flash when 41.8 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) | GLM-5.3-Flash | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 46.8 | 41.8 | −10.7% GLM-5.3-Flash is 10.7% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,027.40 | $305.52 | −70.3% GLM-5.3-Flash is 70.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 15.53s | 38.43s | +147.5% GLM-5.3-Flash is 147.5% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $0.15 / $0.50 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
GLM-5.3-Flash vs Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback): 10.7% less intelligence, 70.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 147.5% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
- GLM-5.3-Flash is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback)GLM-5.3-FlashToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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