Pairwise benchmark snapshot · Aug 16, 2026

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs GPT-5.6 Sol benchmark

Name: Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs GPT-5.6 Sol AI benchmark comparison
Creator: CompareLLM
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

This page compares Claude Sonnet 4.5 (Anthropic) and GPT-5.6 Sol (OpenAI) using the latest snapshots we have as of Aug 16, 2026. On preference Elo, GPT-5.6 Sol is ahead by 84 points (1,608 vs 1,524; seed-bootstrap (Aug 16, 2026)). On SWE-bench coding, GPT-5.6 Sol resolves 77.6% versus 70.1% (seed-bootstrap (Aug 16, 2026)). Claude Sonnet 4.5 streams faster (88 tok/s) while Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the cheaper output token ($15/1M). GPT-5.6 Sol has the larger context window (1.1M tokens). Every cell below is a dated snapshot from a named public source — we do not invent missing scores, and we do not run SWE-bench ourselves.

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Anthropic

Claude Sonnet 4.5

Workhorse Anthropic model: most of Opus coding quality at a mid-tier price.

Elo 1,524$15/1M out

OpenAI

GPT-5.6 Sol

OpenAI 5.6 flagship tier. Official API $5/$30 per 1M tokens (OpenAI pricing, Jul 30 2026 update left Sol unchanged).

Elo 1,608$30/1M out

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Quick vs:vs Claude Opus 4.5 vs Claude Opus 4.6 vs Claude 3.7 Sonnet vs GPT-5

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (4)vsGPT-5.6 Sol (6)

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 4W (40%)Overall: GPT-5.6 SolGPT-5.6 Sol: 6W (60%)

← Claude Sonnet 4.5GPT-5.6 Sol →

GPT-5.6 Sol (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

Preference Elo, Coding proficiency, SWE-bench & LiveBench accuracy

Preference Elo

1,524vs1,608

Coding Elo

1,531vs1,602

SWE-bench

70.1%vs77.6%

LiveBench

67.4%vs73.9%

GPQA Diamond

80.2%vs86.8%

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 0WGPT-5.6 Sol: 5W

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

88 tok/svs84 tok/s

Time to first token

240 msvs270 ms

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 2WGPT-5.6 Sol: 0W

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$15/1Mvs$30/1M

Input price

$3/1Mvs$5/1M

Context window

1Mvs1.1M

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 2WGPT-5.6 Sol: 1W

Capability Matchup Radar

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

Each spoke is a skill. Farther from the center is better (0–100th percentile). Tap any dot to inspect details.

Tap any node to inspect

Percentile 0–100

Dimensional AdvantageGPT-5.6 Sol 4/6

Preference Elo

GPT-5.6 Sol

84 pts advantage

Throughput Speed

Claude Sonnet 4.5

4 tok/s faster

Price Efficiency

Claude Sonnet 4.5

$15.00/1M cheaper

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

—

Elo

High is better

1,524

EloHigh is better

1,608+6%

Code Elo

High is better

1,531

Code EloHigh is better

1,602+5%

LiveBench

High is better

67.4%

LiveBenchHigh is better

73.9%+10%

SWE-bench

High is better

70.1%

SWE-benchHigh is better

77.6%+11%

GPQA

High is better

80.2%

GPQAHigh is better

86.8%+8%

TTFT

Low is better

+13%240 ms

TTFTLow is better

270 ms

Speed

High is better

+5%88 tok/s

SpeedHigh is better

84 tok/s

In $

Low is better

+67%$3/1M

In $Low is better

$5/1M

Out $

Low is better

+100%$15/1M

Out $Low is better

$30/1M

Context

High is better

ContextHigh is better

1.1M+5%

Interactive Simulator

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Simulate monthly production API costs based on published $/1M tokens.

Save up to 47% with Claude Sonnet 4.5

Monthly Volume50M tokens/mo

Quick Presets:

Token Ratio (In vs Out)70% In / 30% Out

RAG / Search (10% out)Coding / Chat (50% out)

Claude Sonnet 4.5$330.00 / mo

In: $105.00Out: $225.00

GPT-5.6 Sol$625.00 / mo

In: $175.00Out: $450.00

Estimated Cost Delta

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is estimated to save $295.00/month ($3,540/year).

Based on 50M tokens (30% gen)

Key Selection Recommendations

1
GPT-5.6 Sol:Pick GPT-5.6 Sol when repo-level coding accuracy is the constraint.
2
Claude Sonnet 4.5:Pick Claude Sonnet 4.5 when you are optimizing output cost.
3
Claude Sonnet 4.5:Pick Claude Sonnet 4.5 when time-to-first-token matters more than peak Elo.

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsGPT-5.6 Sol

Higher SWE-bench (77.6%).

High-volume chatClaude Sonnet 4.5

Lower output list price ($15/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIClaude Sonnet 4.5

Lower TTFT (240 ms).

Long-document RAGGPT-5.6 Sol

Larger window (1.1M).

Screenshots / visionGPT-5.6 Sol

Both accept images. Defaulting to the higher-Elo side (GPT-5.6 Sol).

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	GPT-5.6 Sol	Higher SWE-bench (77.6%).
High-volume chat	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Lower output list price ($15/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Lower TTFT (240 ms).
Long-document RAG	GPT-5.6 Sol	Larger window (1.1M).
Screenshots / vision	GPT-5.6 Sol	Both accept images. Defaulting to the higher-Elo side (GPT-5.6 Sol).

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

View all news

compareAug 12, 2026

Grok vs ChatGPT: price and Elo, not a personality contest

Brand hub remaps to top xAI vs top OpenAI. After Aug 12 that is Grok 4.6 vs Sol.

compareJul 24, 2026

Claude vs GPT benchmark: this hub always remaps to the current Elo leaders

Not a frozen 2025 article. Today that is usually Opus 5 vs GPT-5.6 Sol. Dated cells, not a brand fight.

compareJul 16, 2026

Gemini vs GPT: long context versus the OpenAI flagship invoice

Hub remaps to top Google vs top OpenAI Elo. Usually 3.6 Pro vs Sol. Window vs price is the plot.

launchJul 9, 2026

GPT-5.6 Sol: OpenAI’s $5/$30 flagship tier on this leaderboard

Jul 9 2026 family; Jul 30 price update left Sol unchanged. This is the GPT side of Claude vs GPT.

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LIVE

Anthropic

Claude Sonnet 4.5

Elo 1,524

LiveBench67.4%

SWE-bench70.1%

Speed88 tok/s

Output cost$15/1M

OpenAI

GPT-5.6 Sol

Elo 1,608

LiveBench73.9%

SWE-bench77.6%

Speed84 tok/s

Output cost$30/1M

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GPT-5.6 Sol?: GPT-5.6 Sol has the higher preference Elo in our latest snapshot (1,608). “Better” still depends on coding, price, and latency — see the table.
Which is better at coding, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GPT-5.6 Sol?: GPT-5.6 Sol leads SWE-bench at 77.6% vs 70.1%. SWE-bench is one harness, not your repo.
Which is cheaper to run in production?: Claude Sonnet 4.5 output tokens are $15/1M versus $30/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.
Which is faster, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GPT-5.6 Sol?: Claude Sonnet 4.5 has the lower time-to-first-token (240 ms vs 270 ms). Tokens/sec is a separate column if you care about long completions.
Which has the larger context window?: GPT-5.6 Sol accepts 1.1M tokens versus 1M.
Can I self-host either model?: Neither model is marked open-weights here. You are comparing hosted APIs.
Are these scores from CompareLLM’s own evals?: No. V1 aggregates public leaderboards (and optional first-party latency pings). Each cell names its source and date. Read /methodology.
What does preference Elo mean on this page?: Preference Elo is a crowd vote from LMArena / Arena. People see two hidden answers and pick the one they like more. The model that wins more often gets a higher Elo. That means people preferred it — not that it passed a school test. It is not SWE-bench, not accuracy, and not a number we invent. Claude Sonnet 4.5 and GPT-5.6 Sol Elo cells are dated snapshots from the named source — we do not compute Arena ourselves.

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons

All Claude Sonnet 4.5 matchups →|All GPT-5.6 Sol matchups →

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Claude Sonnet 4 (previous sonnet)Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Claude Sonnet 5 (next sonnet)GPT-5.6 Sol vs GPT-5 (previous gpt-flagship)GPT-4.5 Orion vs Claude Sonnet 4.5 GPT-5.6 Terra vs Claude Sonnet 4.5 GPT-5 vs Claude Sonnet 4.5

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs GPT-5.6 Sol benchmark

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (4)vsGPT-5.6 Sol (6)

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 4W (40%)Overall: GPT-5.6 SolGPT-5.6 Sol: 6W (60%)

← Claude Sonnet 4.5GPT-5.6 Sol →

GPT-5.6 Sol (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

Preference Elo, Coding proficiency, SWE-bench & LiveBench accuracy

Preference Elo

1,524vs1,608

Coding Elo

1,531vs1,602

SWE-bench

70.1%vs77.6%

LiveBench

67.4%vs73.9%

GPQA Diamond

80.2%vs86.8%

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 0WGPT-5.6 Sol: 5W

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

88 tok/svs84 tok/s

Time to first token

240 msvs270 ms

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 2WGPT-5.6 Sol: 0W

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$15/1Mvs$30/1M

Input price

$3/1Mvs$5/1M

Context window

1Mvs1.1M

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 2WGPT-5.6 Sol: 1W

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsGPT-5.6 Sol

Higher SWE-bench (77.6%).

High-volume chatClaude Sonnet 4.5

Lower output list price ($15/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIClaude Sonnet 4.5

Lower TTFT (240 ms).

Long-document RAGGPT-5.6 Sol

Larger window (1.1M).

Screenshots / visionGPT-5.6 Sol

Both accept images. Defaulting to the higher-Elo side (GPT-5.6 Sol).

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	GPT-5.6 Sol	Higher SWE-bench (77.6%).
High-volume chat	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Lower output list price ($15/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Lower TTFT (240 ms).
Long-document RAG	GPT-5.6 Sol	Larger window (1.1M).
Screenshots / vision	GPT-5.6 Sol	Both accept images. Defaulting to the higher-Elo side (GPT-5.6 Sol).

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GPT-5.6 Sol?

GPT-5.6 Sol has the higher preference Elo in our latest snapshot (1,608). “Better” still depends on coding, price, and latency — see the table.

Which is better at coding, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GPT-5.6 Sol?

GPT-5.6 Sol leads SWE-bench at 77.6% vs 70.1%. SWE-bench is one harness, not your repo.

Which is cheaper to run in production?

Claude Sonnet 4.5 output tokens are $15/1M versus $30/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.

Which is faster, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GPT-5.6 Sol?

Claude Sonnet 4.5 has the lower time-to-first-token (240 ms vs 270 ms). Tokens/sec is a separate column if you care about long completions.

Which has the larger context window?

GPT-5.6 Sol accepts 1.1M tokens versus 1M.

Can I self-host either model?

Neither model is marked open-weights here. You are comparing hosted APIs.

Are these scores from CompareLLM’s own evals?

No. V1 aggregates public leaderboards (and optional first-party latency pings). Each cell names its source and date. Read /methodology.

What does preference Elo mean on this page?

Preference Elo is a crowd vote from LMArena / Arena. People see two hidden answers and pick the one they like more. The model that wins more often gets a higher Elo. That means people preferred it — not that it passed a school test. It is not SWE-bench, not accuracy, and not a number we invent. Claude Sonnet 4.5 and GPT-5.6 Sol Elo cells are dated snapshots from the named source — we do not compute Arena ourselves.

Swap or Add Any Model to this Matchup

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Intelligence & Reasoning

Speed & Latency

Pricing & Capacity

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

GPT-5.6 Sol

Claude Sonnet 4.5

Claude Sonnet 4.5

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

Grok vs ChatGPT: price and Elo, not a personality contest

Claude vs GPT benchmark: this hub always remaps to the current Elo leaders

Gemini vs GPT: long context versus the OpenAI flagship invoice

GPT-5.6 Sol: OpenAI’s $5/$30 flagship tier on this leaderboard

Cast Your Matchup Vote

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CompareLLM Matrix

Claude Sonnet 4.5

GPT-5.6 Sol

Frequently Asked Questions

Related news

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons

Swap or Add Any Model to this Matchup

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Intelligence & Reasoning

Speed & Latency

Pricing & Capacity

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

GPT-5.6 Sol

Claude Sonnet 4.5

Claude Sonnet 4.5

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

Grok vs ChatGPT: price and Elo, not a personality contest

Claude vs GPT benchmark: this hub always remaps to the current Elo leaders

Gemini vs GPT: long context versus the OpenAI flagship invoice

GPT-5.6 Sol: OpenAI’s $5/$30 flagship tier on this leaderboard

Cast Your Matchup Vote

Community Discussions (0)

Share card

CompareLLM Matrix

Claude Sonnet 4.5

GPT-5.6 Sol

Frequently Asked Questions

Related news

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons