Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs OpenAI o3
Benchmarks, API pricing and specs, head to head. Data updated 2026-06-10.
Claude Sonnet 4.6
Anthropic · Apr 2026
Anthropic's mid-tier workhorse: near-Opus capability at $3/$15, and the leader on the Finance Agent benchmark.
OpenAI o3
68.9OpenAI · Apr 2025
OpenAI's dedicated 2025 reasoning model that pioneered thinking-with-images and agentic tool use within chain-of-thought.
The verdict
Claude Sonnet 4.6 wins 1 of the 1 benchmarks these models share, against 0 for OpenAI o3. OpenAI o3 is about 1.7x cheaper per blended million tokens (3:1 input:output mix). Claude Sonnet 4.6 also takes 1M of context versus 200K for OpenAI o3.
Benchmark head-to-head 1–0
Specs & pricing
| Claude Sonnet 4.6 | OpenAI o3 | |
|---|---|---|
| modhub Index | — | 68.9 |
| Input price / 1M | $3 | $2 |
| Output price / 1M | $15 | $8 |
| Context window | 1M | 200K |
| Max output | 64K | 100K |
| Open weights | no | no |
| Reasoning model | yes | yes |
| Multimodal input | text, image | text, image |
| Knowledge cutoff | Jan 2026 | May 2024 |
| Released | Apr 2026 | Apr 2025 |
| Example monthly cost* | $52.50 | $32.00 |
* 10M input + 1.5M output tokens per month at list prices, no caching. Green = better value on that row.
Frequently asked questions
- Which is better, Claude Sonnet 4.6 or OpenAI o3?
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 wins 1 of the 1 benchmarks these models share, against 0 for OpenAI o3. OpenAI o3 is about 1.7x cheaper per blended million tokens (3:1 input:output mix). Claude Sonnet 4.6 also takes 1M of context versus 200K for OpenAI o3.
- Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 4.6 or OpenAI o3?
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 costs $3/$15 per million input/output tokens, while OpenAI o3 costs $2/$8. For a typical workload of 10M input and 1.5M output tokens per month, that's $52.50 versus $32.00.
- Which model is better for coding, Claude Sonnet 4.6 or OpenAI o3?
- On SWE-bench Verified — the standard agentic-coding benchmark — Claude Sonnet 4.6 scores ~79.6% versus 69.1% for OpenAI o3, making Claude Sonnet 4.6 the stronger pick for coding agents.
More comparisons
Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs GPT-5.5OpenAI o3 vs GPT-5.5Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs GPT-5.2OpenAI o3 vs GPT-5.2Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs GPT-5.1OpenAI o3 vs GPT-5.1Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs GPT-5OpenAI o3 vs GPT-5Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs GPT-5 miniOpenAI o3 vs GPT-5 miniClaude Sonnet 4.6 vs Claude Fable 5OpenAI o3 vs Claude Fable 5