Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) vs Grok 4.3 (High)
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Grok 4.3 (High) by SpaceXAI? 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 (Xhigh, Default Fallb… scores 27.0 points higher (51.9 vs 24.9) but costs 6.0× as much to run the benchmark ($2177 vs $363; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallb… when you need intelligence above 24.9, and Grok 4.3 (High) when 24.9 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) | Grok 4.3 (High) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 51.9 | 24.9 | −52.0% Grok 4.3 (High) is 52.0% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $2,176.82 | $363.24 | −83.3% Grok 4.3 (High) is 83.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 33.08s | 28.87s | −12.7% Grok 4.3 (High) is 12.7% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $1.25 / $2.50 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Grok 4.3 (High) vs Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback): 52.0% less intelligence, 83.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 12.7% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) scores 53.60 for $2172.
- Grok 4.3 (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Medium) scores 47.80 for $361.
Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback)Grok 4.3 (High)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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