Claude Sonnet 5 (Low) vs GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium)
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5 (Low) by Anthropic or GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) by OpenAI? 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
GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) scores 14.9 points higher (39.2 vs 24.3) but costs 1.5× as much to run the benchmark ($997 vs $653; both premium class). Pick GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Claude Sonnet 5 (Low).
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5 (Low) | GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 24.3 | 39.2 | +61.3% GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) is 61.3% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $652.70 | $997.39 | +52.8% GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) is 52.8% more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 8.68s | 10.52s | +21.2% GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) is 21.2% 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 (Medium) vs Claude Sonnet 5 (Low): 61.3% more intelligence, 52.8% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 21.2% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5 (Low) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (High) scores 50.20 for $521.
- GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
Claude Sonnet 5 (Low)GPT-5.6 Sol (Medium)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
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