Claude 3 OpusvsClaude 3.5 Sonnet
Anthropic vs Anthropic — Side-by-side model comparison
Head-to-Head Comparison
| Metric | Claude 3 Opus | Claude 3.5 Sonnet |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | ||
| Arena Rank | #7 | #8 |
| Context Window | 200K | 200K |
| Input Pricing | $15.00/1M tokens | $3.00/1M tokens |
| Output Pricing | $75.00/1M tokens | $15.00/1M tokens |
| Parameters | Undisclosed | Undisclosed |
| Open Source | No | No |
| Best For | Complex analysis, research, nuanced writing | Coding, analysis, writing, vision |
| Release Date | Mar 4, 2024 | Oct 22, 2024 |
Claude 3 Opus
Claude 3 Opus is Anthropic's most powerful model in the Claude 3 family, designed for the most complex analytical and creative tasks. It excels at nuanced writing, deep research analysis, and tasks requiring sophisticated reasoning across long documents. With a 200K context window and exceptional instruction-following abilities, Opus delivers the highest quality outputs in the Claude lineup, though at a premium price point reflecting its superior capabilities.
View Anthropic profile →Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Claude 3.5 Sonnet was Anthropic's previous generation balanced model that set new industry benchmarks when released. It demonstrated that mid-tier models could compete with and even surpass flagship models from competitors on coding, reasoning, and analysis tasks. The model featured a 200K token context window and introduced Anthropic's Artifacts feature for interactive code execution. Claude 3.5 Sonnet became one of the most popular models for professional developers and enterprises, known for its excellent code generation, careful instruction following, and reduced hallucination rates. While now succeeded by Claude Sonnet 4, it remains widely deployed in production systems and continues to offer strong performance at its price point. It was instrumental in establishing Anthropic as a serious competitor to OpenAI.
View Anthropic profile →Key Differences: Claude 3 Opus vs Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Claude 3 Opus ranks higher in arena benchmarks (#7) indicating stronger overall performance.
Claude 3.5 Sonnet is 5.0x cheaper on average, making it the better choice for high-volume applications.
When to use Claude 3 Opus
- +You need the highest quality output based on arena rankings
- +Quality matters more than cost
- +Your use case involves complex analysis, research, nuanced writing
When to use Claude 3.5 Sonnet
- +Budget is a concern and you need cost efficiency
- +Your use case involves coding, analysis, writing, vision
Cost Analysis
At current pricing, Claude 3.5 Sonnet is 5.0x more affordable than Claude 3 Opus. For a typical enterprise workload processing 100M tokens per month:
Claude 3 Opus monthly cost
$4,500
100M tokens/mo (50/50 in/out)
Claude 3.5 Sonnet monthly cost
$900
100M tokens/mo (50/50 in/out)
The Verdict
Claude 3.5 Sonnet wins our head-to-head comparison with 2 out of 5 category wins. It's the stronger choice for coding, analysis, writing, vision, though Claude 3 Opus holds an edge in complex analysis, research, nuanced writing.
Last compared: March 2026 · Data sourced from public benchmarks and official pricing pages