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Claude 3.5 Sonnet vs LongCat-Flash-Lite

Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite are closely matched at 19.0 and 18.6 on the LLM Stats Score. LongCat-Flash-Lite is 34.3x cheaper per token.

Anthropic · Meituan · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite are closely matched on the overall LLM Stats Score at 19.0 and 18.6.

The models split the 4 individual benchmarks reported for both models evenly.

On price, LongCat-Flash-Lite is roughly 34.3x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.

LongCat-Flash-Lite also accepts a larger context window (256,000 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet

  • you want predictable pricing at $3.00/M input and $15.00/M output

Choose LongCat-Flash-Lite

  • cost matters — it's about 34.3x cheaper per token
  • you process long inputs — it offers a 256,000 token context window
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Feb 2026
  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Anthropic
LongCat-Flash-Lite
Meituan
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
19.0
#223
18.6
#226
Reasoning
20.1
#205
18.9
#220
Coding
11.3
#169
7.0
#200
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
2 of 4
2 of 4
Input price
$3.00 / M
$0.10 / M
Output price
$15.00 / M
$0.40 / M
Context window
200,000
256,000

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

5 shared
Index
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
LongCat-Flash-Lite
Math
23.2#138
17.2#202
Tool use
8.2#151
9.5#143
Writing
9.9#78
13.8#55
Finance
23.3#70
18.2#99
Legal
23.3#57
18.2#84
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

19 reported for Claude 3.5 Sonnet · 13 for LongCat-Flash-Lite

4 shared

Claude 3.5 Sonnet outperforms in 2 benchmarks (GPQA, MMLU), while LongCat-Flash-Lite is better at 2 benchmarks (MMLU-Pro, SWE-Bench Verified).

Both models are evenly matched across the benchmarks.

Fri Oct 09 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Pricing Analysis

Price comparison per million tokens

LongCat-Flash-Lite costs less

For input processing, Claude 3.5 Sonnet ($3.00/1M tokens) is 30.0x more expensive than LongCat-Flash-Lite ($0.10/1M tokens).

For output processing, Claude 3.5 Sonnet ($15.00/1M tokens) is 37.5x more expensive than LongCat-Flash-Lite ($0.40/1M tokens).

In conclusion, Claude 3.5 Sonnet is more expensive than LongCat-Flash-Lite.*

* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens

Lowest available price from all providers
Fri Oct 09 2026 • llm-stats.com
Anthropic
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Input tokens$3.00
Output tokens$15.00
Best providerAnthropic
Meituan
LongCat-Flash-Lite
Input tokens$0.10
Output tokens$0.40
Best providerMeituan
Notice missing or incorrect data?

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

LongCat-Flash-Lite accepts 256,000 input tokens compared to Claude 3.5 Sonnet's 200,000 tokens. Claude 3.5 Sonnet can generate longer responses up to 200,000 tokens, while LongCat-Flash-Lite is limited to 128,000 tokens.

Anthropic
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Input200,000 tokens
Output200,000 tokens
Meituan
LongCat-Flash-Lite
Input256,000 tokens
Output128,000 tokens
Fri Oct 09 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Claude 3.5 Sonnet supports multimodal inputs, whereas LongCat-Flash-Lite does not.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Text
Images
Audio
Video

LongCat-Flash-Lite

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is licensed under a proprietary license, while LongCat-Flash-Lite uses MIT.

License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Proprietary

Closed source

LongCat-Flash-Lite

MIT

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Claude 3.5 Sonnet was released on 2024-10-22, while LongCat-Flash-Lite was released on 2026-02-05.

LongCat-Flash-Lite is 16 months newer than Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Oct 22, 2024

2.0 years ago

LongCat-Flash-Lite

Feb 5, 2026

8 months ago

1.3yr newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Provider Availability

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is available from Anthropic, Bedrock, Google. LongCat-Flash-Lite is available from Meituan.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

anthropic logo
Anthropic
Input Price:Input: $3.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $15.00/1M
bedrock logo
AWS Bedrock
Input Price:Input: $3.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $15.00/1M
google logo
Google
Input Price:Input: $3.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $15.00/1M

LongCat-Flash-Lite

meituan logo
Meituan
Input Price:Input: $0.10/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.40/1M
* Prices shown are per million tokens

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet
✓ Preferred
LongCat-Flash-Lite
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Claude 3.5 Sonnet vs LongCat-Flash-Lite.

Which is better, Claude 3.5 Sonnet or LongCat-Flash-Lite?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite are closely matched on the LLM Stats Score at 19.0 and 18.6. Claude 3.5 Sonnet is made by Anthropic and LongCat-Flash-Lite is made by Meituan. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does Claude 3.5 Sonnet compare to LongCat-Flash-Lite in benchmarks?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet scores GSM8k: 96.4%, DocVQA: 95.2%, AI2D: 94.7%, HumanEval: 93.7%, BIG-Bench Hard: 93.1%. LongCat-Flash-Lite scores MATH-500: 96.8%, MMLU: 85.5%, CMMLU: 82.5%, MMLU-Pro: 78.3%, Tau2 Retail: 73.1%.

Is Claude 3.5 Sonnet cheaper than LongCat-Flash-Lite?

LongCat-Flash-Lite is 30.0x cheaper for input tokens. Claude 3.5 Sonnet costs $3.00/M input and $15.00/M output via anthropic. LongCat-Flash-Lite costs $0.10/M input and $0.40/M output via meituan.

What are the context window sizes for Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet supports 200K tokens and LongCat-Flash-Lite supports 256K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (19.0 vs 18.6), context window (200K vs 256K), input pricing ($3.00 vs $0.10/M), multimodal support (yes vs no), licensing (Proprietary vs MIT). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Claude 3.5 Sonnet and LongCat-Flash-Lite?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is developed by Anthropic and LongCat-Flash-Lite is developed by Meituan.

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