text model comparison
Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Grok 4.6
Claude Sonnet 5.5 and Grok 4.6 are both current text models, from Anthropic and xAI. Both cost $2 per 1M input tokens. On Arena Text, Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores 1476 Elo and Grok 4.6 1454 Elo (Arena, measured October 8, 2026). Claude Sonnet 5.5 has the larger context window, 1,000,000 vs 500,000 tokens.
Data verified October 12, 2026 · Dataset 2026-10-12
Side by side
Standard-tier prices in effect today. The better value in each row is highlighted.
| Fact | Claude Sonnet 5.5 | Grok 4.6 |
|---|---|---|
| Price per 1M input tokens | $2 | $2 |
| Price per 1M output tokens | $10 | $6 (better) |
| Cost of 10M input and 2M output tokens | $40 | $32 (better) |
| Arena Text | 1476 Elo (#17 of 39) (better) | 1454 Elo (#28 of 39) |
| GPQA Diamond | 95.6% (#2 of 37) (better) | 94% (#9 of 37) |
| FrontierMath Tiers 1-3 (v2) | 88.8% (#7 of 37) (better) | 66% (#23 of 37) |
| SimpleQA Verified | 46.5% (#21 of 34) | 49.3% (#19 of 34) (better) |
| Provider | Anthropic | xAI |
| Release date | September 28, 2026 | August 12, 2026 |
| Access | API only | API only |
| Context window | 1,000,000 tokens | 500,000 tokens |
| Max output | 128,000 tokens | Not reported |
| Input | text, image | text, image |
| Output | text | text |
When to choose each
Claude Sonnet 5.5
Best for
- Production workloads that need frontier-adjacent quality at a mid-tier rate
- Latency-sensitive agent steps inside a larger pipeline
Watch out for
- Same list price as Claude Sonnet 5, so the gain is capability and cache economics rather than a cheaper rate card
- Anthropic positions Opus 5.5 rather than this as the default, so reach for Sonnet 5.5 when latency matters more than peak capability
Grok 4.6
Best for
- Coding, agentic, and knowledge-work API evaluations with controlled long-context cost
Watch out for
- Published token rates increase for all tokens in a request once its prompt reaches xAI's 200,000-token long-context threshold
Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Grok 4.6 FAQ
Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Grok 4.6?
Both cost $2 per 1M input tokens. For 10M input and 2M output tokens, Claude Sonnet 5.5 costs $40 and Grok 4.6 $32 at standard rates.
Which scores higher on independent benchmarks, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Grok 4.6?
Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads on Arena Text, 1476 Elo to 1454 Elo; Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads on GPQA Diamond, 95.6% to 94%; Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads on FrontierMath Tiers 1-3 (v2), 88.8% to 66%. Scores are independent evaluations, not either vendor's launch figures.
Which has the larger context window, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Grok 4.6?
Claude Sonnet 5.5 has the larger context window, 1,000,000 vs 500,000 tokens.
Related comparisons
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- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs GPT-5.4
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs GPT-5.6 Terra
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs GPT-6.1 Sol
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs GPT-6 Sol
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Grok 4.5
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Grok 4.7
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Qwen3.8-Max
- Claude Sonnet 5 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5
Production evaluation
Choosing between Claude Sonnet 5.5 and Grok 4.6?
Public benchmarks narrow the shortlist. We run both on your own tasks, data and cost limits, then build the routing and review controls to run the winner in production.
- A head-to-head evaluation on your real workload
- Routing between models by cost and difficulty