Model comparison
Claude Opus 5.5 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5
Compare published specifications, vendor API list prices and measured Borg performance. Both models are included in Borg.
Claude Opus 5.5
Claude Sonnet 5.5
Included in Borg
At a glance
| Specification | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Sonnet 5.5 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | Anthropic |
| Release | 2026-09-22 Vendor source | 2026-09-28 Vendor source |
| Context | 1,000,000 tokens Vendor source | 1,000,000 tokens Vendor source |
| Modalities | Input: text, image; output: text | Input: text, image; output: text |
| Reasoning / thinking modes | Yes / Not published | Yes / Not published |
| Open weights | No | No |
| Vendor API list price / 1M tokens | $4 input / $20 output | $2 input / $10 output |
| Borg | Included in Borg subscription | Included in Borg subscription |
Measured on Borg
Metrics are not directly comparable to vendor benchmark claims. Models served different requests; this is observed gateway traffic, not a controlled head-to-head test.
Time to first token (gateway proxy)
Output tokens per second (whole turn)
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Sonnet 5.5 |
|---|---|---|
| Time to first token (gateway proxy) p50 | 2946 ms (75410 samples) | 2640 ms (35971 samples) |
| Tokens per second (end to end) p50 | 60 output tokens per second (203387 samples) | 76.7 output tokens per second (86888 samples) |
| Request success rate | Not published | Not published |
| Coding bench pass rate | Not published | Not published |
Measurement window, samples and methodology
The fleet reference is the median of published model medians, not a request-weighted result. Prompt lengths, reasoning settings and traffic differ between models.
Claude Opus 5.5: Measured on Borg: SearchAtlas AI Gateway production request logs. 30-day window ending 2026-10-08; 220887 requests. Minimum 100 samples per published request metric.
Claude Sonnet 5.5: Measured on Borg: SearchAtlas AI Gateway production request logs. 30-day window ending 2026-10-08; 94296 requests. Minimum 100 samples per published request metric.
Completion speed covers the whole turn including queueing and reasoning time; it is not a streaming tokens-per-second figure.
- Time to first token (gateway proxy): time until the first streamed response event reaches the gateway; our closest available measure of time to first token
- Tokens per second (end to end): tokens per second, end to end: provider-reported output tokens divided by the whole turn's elapsed time, including queueing and reasoning; not a streaming per-token rate
Vendor benchmarks
Vendor-reported scores may use different settings; do not treat them as a controlled head-to-head test.
How to choose
Claude Opus 5.5 is listed for long-running agentic coding across repositories, whereas Claude Sonnet 5.5 is listed for well-scoped bug fixes and code reviews. Choosing between Claude Opus 5.5 and Claude Sonnet 5.5 requires checking published specifications against observed Borg traffic for your workflow.
Key differences
| Spec | Claude Opus 5.5 | Claude Sonnet 5.5 |
|---|---|---|
| Context window | 1,000,000 tokens Vendor source | 1,000,000 tokens Vendor source |
| Reasoning modes | Yes / Not published | Yes / Not published |
| Release date | 2026-09-22 Vendor source | 2026-09-28 Vendor source |
| API price input / 1M | 4 | 2 Lower listed rate |
| API price output / 1M | 20 | 10 Lower listed rate |
| Time to first token (gateway proxy) | 2946 ms (75410 samples) | 2640 ms (35971 samples) Lower median |
| Output tokens per second (whole turn) | 60 output tokens/s (whole turn) (203387 samples) | 76.7 output tokens/s (whole turn) (86888 samples) Higher measured rate |
| Request success | Not published | Not published |
| Coding bench | Not published | Not published |
FAQ
How do Claude Opus 5.5 and Claude Sonnet 5.5 compare for coding?
Claude Opus 5.5 has a Borg coding benchmark of not published; Claude Sonnet 5.5 has not published. The Claude Opus 5.5–Claude Sonnet 5.5 coding comparison cannot establish an overall winner from this small test alone.
How quickly do Claude Opus 5.5 and Claude Sonnet 5.5 start responding on Borg?
Borg median first response for Claude Opus 5.5 is 2,946 ms; for Claude Sonnet 5.5 it is 2,640 ms. The Claude Opus 5.5–Claude Sonnet 5.5 gateway medians are observations, not guaranteed latency for individual requests.
What are the API prices for Claude Opus 5.5 and Claude Sonnet 5.5?
The listed API rate for Claude Opus 5.5 is $4 input / $20 output per 1M tokens; for Claude Sonnet 5.5 it is $2 input / $10 output per 1M tokens. Neither Claude Opus 5.5 nor Claude Sonnet 5.5 has its Borg subscription charge represented by those provider API rates. Claude Opus 5.5 vendor source · Claude Sonnet 5.5 vendor source