Model Comparison
Claude Opus 4.6 vs o3Which is better in 2026?
Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. o3 is 2.9x cheaper per token.
Verdict: Claude Opus 4.6 vs o3 — which is better?
Claude Opus 4.6 (by Anthropic) and o3 (by OpenAI) are two of the AI models people compare most. Here is how they stack up on benchmarks, price and capabilities, and which one to pick in 2026.
Claude Opus 4.6 outperforms in 9 benchmarks (AIME 2025, ARC-AGI v2, BrowseComp, GPQA, Humanity's Last Exam, MMMU-Pro, SWE-Bench Verified, Tau2 Retail, Tau2 Telecom), while o3 is better at 1 benchmark (CharXiv-R). Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
On price, o3 is roughly 2.9x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.
Claude Opus 4.6 also accepts a larger context window (1,000,000 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.
Choose Claude Opus 4.6 if…
- you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 9 of 10 shared benchmarks
- you process long inputs — it offers a 1,000,000 token context window
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Feb 2026
Choose o3 if…
- cost matters — it's about 2.9x cheaper per token
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
Claude Opus 4.6 outperforms in 9 benchmarks (AIME 2025, ARC-AGI v2, BrowseComp, GPQA, Humanity's Last Exam, MMMU-Pro, SWE-Bench Verified, Tau2 Retail, Tau2 Telecom), while o3 is better at 1 benchmark (CharXiv-R).
Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Arena Performance
Human preference votes
Pricing Analysis
Price comparison per million tokens
For input processing, Claude Opus 4.6 ($5.00/1M tokens) is 2.5x more expensive than o3 ($2.00/1M tokens).
For output processing, Claude Opus 4.6 ($25.00/1M tokens) is 3.1x more expensive than o3 ($8.00/1M tokens).
In conclusion, Claude Opus 4.6 is more expensive than o3.*
* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Claude Opus 4.6 accepts 1,000,000 input tokens compared to o3's 200,000 tokens. Claude Opus 4.6 can generate longer responses up to 128,000 tokens, while o3 is limited to 100,000 tokens.
Input Capabilities
Supported data types and modalities
Both Claude Opus 4.6 and o3 support multimodal inputs.
They are both capable of processing various types of data, offering versatility in application.
Claude Opus 4.6
o3
License
Usage and distribution terms
Both models are licensed under proprietary licenses.
Both models have usage restrictions defined by their respective organizations.
Proprietary
Closed source
Proprietary
Closed source
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Claude Opus 4.6 was released on 2026-02-05, while o3 was released on 2025-04-16.
Claude Opus 4.6 is 10 months newer than o3.
Feb 5, 2026
5 months ago
9mo newerApr 16, 2025
1.2 years ago
Knowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
o3 has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2024-05-31, while Claude Opus 4.6's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm o3's training data extends to 2024-05-31, but cannot make a direct comparison without Claude Opus 4.6's cutoff date.
—
May 2024
Provider Availability
Claude Opus 4.6 is available from Anthropic. o3 is available from OpenAI.
Claude Opus 4.6
o3
Outputs Comparison
Key Takeaways
Claude Opus 4.6
View detailsAnthropic
o3
View detailsOpenAI
Claude Opus 4.6o3Detailed Comparison
Interactive Arena
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against Claude Opus 4.6 and o3 side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
| Feature | | |
|---|
FAQ
Common questions about Claude Opus 4.6 vs o3.