Cheaper overall
Claude Opus 5.5
20% lower blended rate
Higher benchmark scores
Claude Opus 5.5
leads on 13 of 14 figures
Cheaper cached input
Claude Opus 5.5
$0.20 vs $0.50, 60% less
Where each one wins
Claude Opus 5.5
- Cheaper input tokens $4.00 vs $5.00, 20% less
- Cheaper output tokens $20.00 vs $25.00, 20% less
- Cheaper cached input $0.20 vs $0.50, 60% less
- Cheaper on all four workloads
- Higher overall intelligence (Intelligence Index) 57.6 vs 50.8
- Higher expert-exam performance (Humanity's Last Exam) 61.4 vs 54.9
- Higher long-context reasoning (AA-LCR) 84.7 vs 82
- Ahead on 10 more benchmark figures
Claude Opus 5
- Higher Mobileapps Elo 1,348 vs 1,340
What four workloads cost
One run, and the same run a thousand times.
Claude Opus 5.5 is cheaper on all four workloads, by much the same margin each time — about 1.3 times, from $0.0140 against $0.0175 on a chat turn to $1.66 against $2.08 on a long document.
| Workload | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Opus 5 | ×1,000 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chat turn 1,000 in / 500 out | $0.0140 | $0.0175 | $14.00 / $17.50 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 20% cheaper |
| RAG answer 10,000 in / 800 out | $0.0560 | $0.0700 | $56.00 / $70.00 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 20% cheaper |
| Agent loop 32,000 in / 700 out × 20 calls | $0.5600 | $0.8500 | $560.00 / $850.00 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 34% cheaper |
| Long document 400,000 in / 3,000 out | $1.66 | $2.08 | $1,660.00 / $2,075.00 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 20% cheaper |
Price per 1M tokens
Neither model changes its rate with prompt length, so these rates apply to every request.
| Context band | Price | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Opus 5 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Any prompt length | Input | $4.00 | $5.00 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 20% cheaper |
| Any prompt length | Cached input | $0.20 | $0.50 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 60% cheaper |
| Any prompt length | Output | $20.00 | $25.00 | Claude Opus 5.5 is 20% cheaper |
Blended: Claude Opus 5.5 $8.00, Claude Opus 5 $10.00 per 1M — one rate at 3:1 input to output, for comparing two models at a glance.
Both priced by Anthropic. Standard tier, pay-as-you-go.
Other pricing tiers
Both models offer Batch, worth up to 50% off their standard rates, and the cheaper model is the same one on every tier — so the tier you buy changes the bill rather than the choice.
Every tier either model sells is here, so this is the whole price sheet. A saving is measured against that model's own standard rate — how we read tiers.
| Tier | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Opus 5 | Cheaper |
|---|---|---|---|
| Batch | $2.00 in / $10.00 out 50% off Standard | $2.50 in / $12.50 out 50% off Standard | Claude Opus 5.5 |
Benchmarks
They share 14 figures: Claude Opus 5.5 leads on 13, Claude Opus 5 on 1. The widest gap is 134 points, on Gamedev Elo.
Overall intelligence
Intelligence Index — Overall intelligence across reasoning, knowledge & math evals
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 6.8
Expert-exam performance
Humanity's Last Exam — Expert-level questions across many academic domains
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 6.5
Long-context reasoning
AA-LCR — Long-context reasoning across large inputs
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 2.7
Scientific coding
SciCode — Research-level scientific coding tasks
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 10.5
Physics research reasoning
CritPt — Unpublished physics research reasoning problems
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 2.6
Real-world task performance
GDPval — Economically valuable, real-world knowledge work
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 6.9
Factual accuracy
Omniscience Accuracy — Breadth of factual knowledge across domains
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 5.3
Answer reliability
Omniscience Non-Hallucination — How reliably the model avoids fabricated answers
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 0.9
Mobileapps Elo
Design Arena head-to-head rating in the mobileapps category
Claude Opus 5 ahead by 8
3d Elo
Design Arena head-to-head rating in the 3d category
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 104
Dataviz Elo
Design Arena head-to-head rating in the dataviz category
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 29
Gamedev Elo
Design Arena head-to-head rating in the gamedev category
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 134
Svg Elo
Design Arena head-to-head rating in the svg category
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 13
Website Elo
Design Arena head-to-head rating in the website category
Claude Opus 5.5 ahead by 43
Each figure is that model's best published run, with the effort level named beside it — where these scores come from.
Specifications
Both list the same capabilities, so nothing here separates them.
| Specification | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Opus 5 |
|---|---|---|
| Context window | 1,000,000 tokens | 1,000,000 tokens |
| Max output | 128,000 tokens | 128,000 tokens |
| Takes in | Text, image, file | Text, image, file |
| Puts out | Text | Text |
| Knowledge cutoff | 30 Jun 2026 | — |
| Released | 22 Sep 2026 | 24 Jul 2026 |
| Status | Active | Active |
| Sold by | Anthropic, Perplexity | Anthropic, Perplexity |
| Tool use | Yes | Yes |
| Structured outputs | Yes | Yes |
| Web search | Not listed | Not listed |
| Prompt caching | Yes | Yes |
| Code execution | Yes | Yes |
| Computer use | Yes | Yes |
| Open weights | Not listed | Not listed |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yes |
FAQs
- Is Claude Opus 5.5 cheaper than Claude Opus 5?
- Yes. A 1,000-token prompt with a 500-token reply costs $0.0140 on Claude Opus 5.5 and $0.0175 on Claude Opus 5, and the same model is cheaper on every workload on this page.
- How much do Claude Opus 5.5 and Claude Opus 5 cost per 1M tokens?
- Claude Opus 5.5 costs $4.00 for input and $20.00 for output. Claude Opus 5 costs $5.00 and $25.00. Standard pay-as-you-go rates, as of 22 Sep 2026.
- Which is better, Claude Opus 5.5 or Claude Opus 5?
- On published benchmarks, Claude Opus 5.5. It leads on 13 of the 14 figures both models report, including overall intelligence (Intelligence Index), where it scores 57.6 against 50.8.
- Is Batch pricing cheaper for Claude Opus 5.5 or Claude Opus 5?
- Batch input costs $2.00 on Claude Opus 5.5 and $2.50 on Claude Opus 5, 50% below the standard rate on both.