Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort) vs Kimi K2.7 Code
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort) by Anthropic or Kimi K2.7 Code by Kimi? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-08-07.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Ma… scores 12.3 points higher (55.3 vs 43.0) but costs 7.4× as much to run the benchmark ($4011 vs $545; flagship vs premium cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Ma… when you need intelligence above 43.0, and Kimi K2.7 Code when 43.0 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort) | Kimi K2.7 Code | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 55.3 | 43.0 | −22.2% Kimi K2.7 Code is 22.2% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,010.51 | $544.58 | −86.4% Kimi K2.7 Code is 86.4% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 204.62s | 66.82s | −67.3% Kimi K2.7 Code is 67.3% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $0.95 / $4.00 | |
| Input modalities | Not reported | Not reported |
Kimi K2.7 Code vs Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort): 22.2% less intelligence, 86.4% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 67.3% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5 (max) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort) scores 63.10 for $3836.
- Kimi K2.7 Code is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-5.6 Luna (max) scores 52.30 for $172.
Claude Sonnet 5 (Adaptive Reasoning, Max Effort)Kimi K2.7 CodeToday's Pareto frontierEvery other model
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