Pairwise benchmark snapshot · Aug 17, 2026noindex (thin pair)

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs OpenAI: o4 Mini benchmark

Name: Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs OpenAI: o4 Mini AI benchmark comparison
Creator: CompareLLM
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

This page compares Claude Sonnet 4.5 (Anthropic) and OpenAI: o4 Mini (OpenAI) using the latest snapshots we have as of Aug 17, 2026. OpenAI: o4 Mini wins on output price at $4.4/1M. Claude Sonnet 4.5 has the larger context window (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

OpenAI: o4 Mini

Auto-discovered from OpenRouter (openai/o4-mini). Preview until a second source matches.

$4.4/1M out

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Model A

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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 (8)vsOpenAI: o4 Mini (2)

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 8W (80%)Overall: Claude Sonnet 4.5OpenAI: o4 Mini: 2W (20%)

← Claude Sonnet 4.5OpenAI: o4 Mini →

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

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

Preference Elo

1,524vs—

Coding Elo

1,531vs—

SWE-bench

70.1%vs—

LiveBench

67.4%vs—

GPQA Diamond

80.2%vs—

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 5WOpenAI: o4 Mini: 0W

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

88 tok/svs—

Time to first token

240 msvs—

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 2WOpenAI: o4 Mini: 0W

OpenAI: o4 Mini (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$15/1Mvs$4.4/1M

Input price

$3/1Mvs$1.1/1M

Context window

1Mvs200k

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 1WOpenAI: o4 Mini: 2W

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 AdvantageClaude Sonnet 4.5 5/6

Preference Elo

No shared data

Throughput Speed

No shared data

Price Efficiency

OpenAI: o4 Mini

$10.60/1M cheaper

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

—

Elo

High is better

1,524

EloHigh is better

—

Code Elo

High is better

1,531

Code EloHigh is better

—

LiveBench

High is better

67.4%

LiveBenchHigh is better

—

SWE-bench

High is better

70.1%

SWE-benchHigh is better

—

GPQA

High is better

80.2%

GPQAHigh is better

—

TTFT

Low is better

240 ms

TTFTLow is better

—

Speed

High is better

88 tok/s

SpeedHigh is better

—

In $

Low is better

$3/1M

In $Low is better

$1.1/1M+173%

Out $

Low is better

$15/1M

Out $Low is better

$4.4/1M+241%

Context

High is better

+400%1M

ContextHigh is better

200k

Interactive Simulator

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

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

Save up to 68% with OpenAI: o4 Mini

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

OpenAI: o4 Mini$104.50 / mo

In: $38.50Out: $66.00

Estimated Cost Delta

OpenAI: o4 Mini is estimated to save $225.50/month ($2,706/year).

Based on 50M tokens (30% gen)

Key Selection Recommendations

1
OpenAI: o4 Mini:Pick OpenAI: o4 Mini when you are optimizing output cost.
2
Claude Sonnet 4.5:Pick Claude Sonnet 4.5 for million-token RAG or long-document jobs.

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsinsufficient data

Need SWE-bench on both sides.

High-volume chatOpenAI: o4 Mini

Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIinsufficient data

Need TTFT on both sides.

Long-document RAGClaude Sonnet 4.5

Larger window (1M).

Screenshots / visionClaude Sonnet 4.5

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	insufficient data	Need SWE-bench on both sides.
High-volume chat	OpenAI: o4 Mini	Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	insufficient data	Need TTFT on both sides.
Long-document RAG	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Larger window (1M).
Screenshots / vision	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

View all news

launchFeb 18, 2026

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the previous workhorse — still a valid vs baseline

Most of Opus 4.5 coding at a mid-tier price. Sonnet 5 replaced it as the buy; 4.5 remains a compare baseline.

Community Sentiment

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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

OpenAI: o4 Mini

Elo n/a

LiveBench—

SWE-bench—

Speed—

Output cost$4.4/1M

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or OpenAI: o4 Mini?: We do not have preference Elo for both models, so we do not declare an overall winner. Compare the metrics that exist.
Which is better at coding, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or OpenAI: o4 Mini?: SWE-bench is missing for at least one model, so we do not rank coding from a single number.
Which is cheaper to run in production?: OpenAI: o4 Mini output tokens are $4.4/1M versus $15/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.
Which is faster, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or OpenAI: o4 Mini?: We do not have TTFT for both models.
Which has the larger context window?: Claude Sonnet 4.5 accepts 1M tokens versus 200k.
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 OpenAI: o4 Mini 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 OpenAI: o4 Mini matchups →

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Claude Sonnet 4 (previous sonnet)Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Claude Sonnet 5 (next sonnet)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 Opus 4.5 vs Claude Sonnet 4.5

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs OpenAI: o4 Mini benchmark

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (8)vsOpenAI: o4 Mini (2)

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 8W (80%)Overall: Claude Sonnet 4.5OpenAI: o4 Mini: 2W (20%)

← Claude Sonnet 4.5OpenAI: o4 Mini →

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

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

Preference Elo

1,524vs—

Coding Elo

1,531vs—

SWE-bench

70.1%vs—

LiveBench

67.4%vs—

GPQA Diamond

80.2%vs—

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 5WOpenAI: o4 Mini: 0W

Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

88 tok/svs—

Time to first token

240 msvs—

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 2WOpenAI: o4 Mini: 0W

OpenAI: o4 Mini (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$15/1Mvs$4.4/1M

Input price

$3/1Mvs$1.1/1M

Context window

1Mvs200k

Claude Sonnet 4.5: 1WOpenAI: o4 Mini: 2W

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsinsufficient data

Need SWE-bench on both sides.

High-volume chatOpenAI: o4 Mini

Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIinsufficient data

Need TTFT on both sides.

Long-document RAGClaude Sonnet 4.5

Larger window (1M).

Screenshots / visionClaude Sonnet 4.5

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	insufficient data	Need SWE-bench on both sides.
High-volume chat	OpenAI: o4 Mini	Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	insufficient data	Need TTFT on both sides.
Long-document RAG	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Larger window (1M).
Screenshots / vision	Claude Sonnet 4.5	Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or OpenAI: o4 Mini?

We do not have preference Elo for both models, so we do not declare an overall winner. Compare the metrics that exist.

Which is better at coding, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or OpenAI: o4 Mini?

SWE-bench is missing for at least one model, so we do not rank coding from a single number.

Which is cheaper to run in production?

OpenAI: o4 Mini output tokens are $4.4/1M versus $15/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.

Which is faster, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or OpenAI: o4 Mini?

We do not have TTFT for both models.

Which has the larger context window?

Claude Sonnet 4.5 accepts 1M tokens versus 200k.

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 OpenAI: o4 Mini 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

No shared data

No shared data

OpenAI: o4 Mini

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the previous workhorse — still a valid vs baseline

Cast Your Matchup Vote

Community Discussions (0)

Share card

CompareLLM Matrix

Claude Sonnet 4.5

OpenAI: o4 Mini

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

No shared data

No shared data

OpenAI: o4 Mini

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the previous workhorse — still a valid vs baseline

Cast Your Matchup Vote

Community Discussions (0)

Share card

CompareLLM Matrix

Claude Sonnet 4.5

OpenAI: o4 Mini

Frequently Asked Questions

Related news

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons