Claude Opus 5.5 vs Grok 4.6: pricing and benchmarks
Grok 4.6 is 50% cheaper on input tokens ($2.00 vs $4.00 per 1M). Grok 4.6 is 70% cheaper on output tokens ($6.00 vs $20.00 per 1M). On our document Q&A workload (50,000 questions a month), Grok 4.6 costs $980.00 a month versus $2,200 for Claude Opus 5.5, 55% less. Claude Opus 5.5 scores 166.8 on the Epoch Capabilities Index vs 156.3 for Grok 4.6.
Which should you choose?
Claude Opus 5.5 scores 166.8 on the Epoch Capabilities Index vs 156.3 for Grok 4.6.
Claude Opus 5.5 scores 91.2% on FrontierMath (Tiers 1–3) vs 66.0% for Grok 4.6.
Grok 4.6 costs $3.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 input-to-output mix) vs $8.00 for Claude Opus 5.5, 63% less.
A trade-off: Claude Opus 5.5 is 10.5 ECI points more capable but costs 2.7x as much as Grok 4.6.
Pricing and specs
| Claude Opus 5.5 | Grok 4.6 | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | xAI |
| API model ID | claude-opus-5-5 | grok-4.6 |
| Input / 1M tokens | $4.00 | $2.00 |
| Cached input / 1M tokens | $0.20 | $0.50 |
| Output / 1M tokens | $20.00 | $6.00 |
| Long-context rates | — | $4.00 in / $12.00 out above 200K prompt tokens |
| Context window | 1M tokens | 500K tokens |
| Max output | 128K tokens | — |
| Batch discount | 50% off | — |
Benchmarks
| Claude Opus 5.5 | Grok 4.6 | |
|---|---|---|
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 166.8 | 156.3 |
| GPQA Diamond· Science reasoning | 90.6% | 94.0% |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1–3)· Advanced math | 91.2% | 66.0% |
| SimpleQA Verified· Factual accuracy | 72.2% | 49.3% |
| ARC-AGI-2· Abstract reasoning | 93.3% | 67.1% |
| DeepSWE· Coding | — | 67.5% |
| APEX-Agents· Agentic work | 73.5% | 65.3% |
Source: Epoch AI, best recorded result per model (CC BY 4.0). A dash means no published score. See all benchmarks
Monthly cost for real workloads
| Workload | Claude Opus 5.5 | Grok 4.6 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
Support chatbot 100,000 replies a month, ~1,500 input tokens (system prompt + history) and ~400 output tokens each. | $1,400 | $540.00 | Grok 4.6 61% cheaper |
Document Q&A (RAG) 50,000 questions a month with ~8,000 tokens of retrieved context and ~600 output tokens each. | $2,200 | $980.00 | Grok 4.6 55% cheaper |
Coding agent 10,000 agent steps a month, ~40,000 input tokens each (70% read from the prompt cache) and ~2,000 output tokens. | $936.00 | $500.00 | Grok 4.6 47% cheaper |
Cached chatbot The same 100,000-reply support chatbot, but 60% of each prompt (system prompt + conversation history) is served from the prompt cache. | $1,058 | $405.00 | Grok 4.6 62% cheaper |
Meeting notes 10,000 meetings a month summarized from ~12,000-token transcripts, ~1,000 output tokens each. | $680.00 | $300.00 | Grok 4.6 56% cheaper |
Bulk translation 200,000 short translations a month, ~800 input and ~800 output tokens each. | $3,840 | $1,280 | Grok 4.6 67% cheaper |
Content moderation 1,000,000 classifications a month, ~400 input tokens and ~80 output tokens each. | $3,200 | $1,280 | Grok 4.6 60% cheaper |
Article drafting 300 long-form articles a month written from a ~4,000-token brief and outline, ~5,000 output tokens each. | $34.80 | $11.40 | Grok 4.6 67% cheaper |
Code review bot 30,000 pull-request reviews a month, ~5,000 input tokens each (30% cached repository context) and ~700 output tokens. | $849.00 | $358.50 | Grok 4.6 58% cheaper |
Invoice extraction 100,000 documents a month parsed into structured JSON, ~1,200 input and ~250 output tokens each. | $980.00 | $390.00 | Grok 4.6 60% cheaper |
Estimates use standard list prices and ignore cache-write surcharges. Different tokenizers can count the same text differently, so test with your own prompts.
Claude Opus 5.5 vs Grok 4.6 cost calculator
- $980.00/mo$0.02 / req
- Claude Opus 5.5Anthropic$2,200/mo$0.04 / req
Standard-tier list prices. Long-context rates apply automatically where the provider publishes a threshold. Excludes cache-write surcharges, taxes, batch and volume discounts.
Claude Opus 5.5 pricing notes
Anthropic’s recommended default model for most workloads, with adaptive thinking always on.
- Cache reads cost 5% of the input price, against 10% on Claude Opus 5 and Sonnet 5.
- Cache writes cost $5 (5-minute cache) or $8 (1-hour cache) per 1M tokens.
- Fast mode costs $8 input / $40 output per 1M tokens.
- US-only inference (inference_geo: "us") costs 1.1x.
Grok 4.6 pricing notes
xAI’s flagship model for code and everything else, with agentic tool calling and configurable reasoning.
- Requests with 200K or more prompt tokens are billed at $4 input / $1 cached / $12 output for all tokens.
- Web Search costs $5 per 1,000 calls; X Search is billed per item fetched, at $5 per 1,000 posts and $10 per 1,000 user profiles.
Frequently asked questions
- Is Claude Opus 5.5 cheaper than Grok 4.6?
- Grok 4.6 is 50% cheaper on input tokens ($2.00 vs $4.00 per 1M). Grok 4.6 is 70% cheaper on output tokens ($6.00 vs $20.00 per 1M). On our document Q&A workload (50,000 questions a month), Grok 4.6 costs $980.00 a month versus $2,200 for Claude Opus 5.5, 55% less.
- Which is more capable, Claude Opus 5.5 or Grok 4.6?
- Claude Opus 5.5 scores 166.8 on the Epoch Capabilities Index vs 156.3 for Grok 4.6.
- How much does Claude Opus 5.5 cost per 1M tokens?
- Claude Opus 5.5 costs $4.00 per 1M input tokens and $20.00 per 1M output tokens, and $0.20 per 1M cached input tokens on Anthropic’s standard tier.
- How much does Grok 4.6 cost per 1M tokens?
- Grok 4.6 costs $2.00 per 1M input tokens and $6.00 per 1M output tokens, and $0.50 per 1M cached input tokens on xAI’s standard tier.
- Which has the larger context window, Claude Opus 5.5 or Grok 4.6?
- Claude Opus 5.5 has the larger context window: 1M tokens versus 500K for Grok 4.6.