Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) vs GPT-5.6 Sol (Max)
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) by OpenAI? 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
GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) scores 0.2 points higher (47.0 vs 46.8) but costs 3.4× as much to run the benchmark ($3465 vs $1027; flagship vs premium cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) when you need intelligence above 46.8, and Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallba… when 46.8 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) | GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 46.8 | 47.0 | +0.4% GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) is 0.4% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,027.40 | $3,464.84 | +237.2% GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) is 3.4× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 14.89s | 91.96s | +517.6% GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) is 517.6% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $4.00 / $20.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) vs Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback): 0.4% more intelligence, 237.2% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 517.6% 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.
- GPT-5.6 Sol (Max) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Kimi K3.1 Pro scores 55.10 for $3117.
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (High, Default Fallback)GPT-5.6 Sol (Max)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
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