Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) vs GLM-5.3 (Low)
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or GLM-5.3 (Low) by Z AI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Clear winner
Verdict
Pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback)
GLM-5.3 (Low) vs Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback): 15.9% less intelligence, 62.7% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 413.9% slower end-to-end.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) | GLM-5.3 (Low) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 40.8 | 34.3 | −15.9% GLM-5.3 (Low) is 15.9% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $622.28 | $1,012.50 | +62.7% GLM-5.3 (Low) is 62.7% more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 6.11s | 31.40s | +413.9% GLM-5.3 (Low) is 413.9% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $1.40 / $4.40 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (High) scores 50.20 for $521.
- GLM-5.3 (Low) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Medium, Default Fallback)GLM-5.3 (Low)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-5-5-medium/glm-5-3-low · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-sonnet-5-5-medium/glm-5-3-low?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill