GPT-5.6 Sol vs Qwen3.6 Max Preview vs Claude Opus 5
Too close to call on our weighted score (GPT-5.6 Sol 66, Claude Opus 5 66, Qwen3.6 Max Preview 54). The right pick depends on what you value most.
OpenAIGPT-5.6 Sol
66/100- ECI161.8
- Price$4.00 / $20.00
- Context1.05M
Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen3.6 Max Preview
54/100- ECI149.2
- Price$1.30 / $7.80
- Context262K
AnthropicClaude Opus 5
66/100- ECI162.9
- Price$5.00 / $25.00
- Context1M
Too close to call
It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (GPT-5.6 Sol 66/100, Claude Opus 5 66/100, Qwen3.6 Max Preview 54/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Claude Opus 5 for raw capability, Qwen3.6 Max Preview on price and GPT-5.6 Sol for long inputs. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
- CapabilityClaude Opus 5Capabilities Index (ECI): Claude Opus 5 162.9 · GPT-5.6 Sol 161.8 · Qwen3.6 Max Preview 149.2
- Lowest priceQwen3.6 Max PreviewQwen3.6 Max Preview $2.92 · GPT-5.6 Sol $8.00 · Claude Opus 5 $10.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
- Longest contextGPT-5.6 SolGPT-5.6 Sol 1,050,000 · Claude Opus 5 1,000,000 · Qwen3.6 Max Preview 262,144 tokens
- Widest inputsGPT-5.6 Sol and Claude Opus 5GPT-5.6 Sol: Text, Images, PDFs · Qwen3.6 Max Preview: Text · Claude Opus 5: Text, Images, PDFs
- Self-hostingNo open weightsAll three are available only through APIs
| Measure | Weight | GPT-5.6 Sol | Qwen3.6 Max Preview | Claude Opus 5 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI) | 50% | 93 | 77 | 94 |
| Price | 25% | 7 | 28 | 2 |
| Inputs & features | 15% | 80 | 35 | 80 |
| Context window | 10% | 61 | 37 | 60 |
| Overall | 100% | 66/100 | 54/100 | 66/100 |
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | GPT-5.6 SolOpenAI | Qwen3.6 Max PreviewAlibaba (Qwen) | Claude Opus 5Anthropic |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | 161.8 | 149.2 | 162.9 (best) |
| ECI rank | #8 of 148 | #54 of 148 | #5 of 148 (best) |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 93.5% | 87.4% | 93.9% (best) |
| FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics | 89.1% (best) | — | 85.6% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 100% (best) | 91.1% | 98.9% |
| SWE-bench VerifiedFixing real GitHub issues | — | 76.7% | — |
| SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions | 69.7% (best) | 52.0% | 59.9% |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | $4.00 | $1.30 (best) | $5.00 |
| Output | $20.00 | $7.80 (best) | $25.00 |
| Cached input | $0.40 | $0.13 (best) | $0.50 |
| Blended (3:1) | $8.00 | $2.92 (best) | $10.00 |
| Long-context rate | Over 272K: $8.00 / $30.00 | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | Official OpenAI API | Official Alibaba API | Official Anthropic API |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 1,050,000 tokens (best) | 262,144 tokens | 1,000,000 tokens |
| Max output | 128,000 tokens (best) | 65,536 tokens | 128,000 tokens (best) |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | Yes | No | Yes |
| PDFs | Yes | No | Yes |
| Audio | No | No | No |
| Video | No | No | No |
| Reasoning | Yeslow · medium · high · xhigh · max | Yes | Yeslow · medium · high · xhigh · max |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | Yes | No | Yes |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | Proprietary | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| API model ID | gpt-5.6-sol | qwen3.6-max-preview | claude-opus-5 |
| API providers | 40 (best) | 10 | 35 |
| Released | Jul 9, 2026 | Apr 20, 2026 | Jul 24, 2026 |
| Knowledge cutoff | Feb 16, 2026 | Apr 2025 | May 2026 |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- GPT-5.6 Sol$80.00
- Qwen3.6 Max Preview$28.60
- Claude Opus 5$100.00
Which should you choose?
Which is better: GPT-5.6 Sol, Qwen3.6 Max Preview or Claude Opus 5?
It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (GPT-5.6 Sol 66/100, Claude Opus 5 66/100, Qwen3.6 Max Preview 54/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Claude Opus 5 for raw capability, Qwen3.6 Max Preview on price and GPT-5.6 Sol for long inputs. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
Which is cheaper, GPT-5.6 Sol, Qwen3.6 Max Preview or Claude Opus 5?
Qwen3.6 Max Preview is cheaper at $1.30 input / $7.80 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). GPT-5.6 Sol costs $4.00 input / $20.00 output per million tokens (official OpenAI API price); Claude Opus 5 costs $5.00 input / $25.00 output per million tokens (official Anthropic API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $2.92 per million tokens for Qwen3.6 Max Preview versus $8.00 for GPT-5.6 Sol (2.7× as much) and $10.00 for Claude Opus 5 (3.4× as much).
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
Claude Opus 5 scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Claude Opus 5 162.9 (#5 of 148), GPT-5.6 Sol 161.8 (#8 of 148) and Qwen3.6 Max Preview 149.2 (#54 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (160.2–166.7 vs 159.3–165.3), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Claude Opus 5 93.9%, GPT-5.6 Sol 93.5%, Qwen3.6 Max Preview 87.4%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — GPT-5.6 Sol 100%, Claude Opus 5 98.9%, Qwen3.6 Max Preview 91.1%; SimpleQA Verified — GPT-5.6 Sol 69.7%, Claude Opus 5 59.9%, Qwen3.6 Max Preview 52.0%.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for GPT-5.6 Sol and Claude Opus 5 yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Claude Opus 5 leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.
Which has the bigger context window?
GPT-5.6 Sol has the largest context window at 1,050,000 tokens, against 1,000,000 for Claude Opus 5 and 262,144 for Qwen3.6 Max Preview. Maximum output per response: GPT-5.6 Sol up to 128,000, Qwen3.6 Max Preview up to 65,536, Claude Opus 5 up to 128,000 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
GPT-5.6 Sol accepts text, images and PDFs; Qwen3.6 Max Preview accepts text; Claude Opus 5 accepts text, images and PDFs. GPT-5.6 Sol handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
No. GPT-5.6 Sol, Qwen3.6 Max Preview and Claude Opus 5 are proprietary and only available through APIs and apps.
Which is newer?
Claude Opus 5 is the newest, released Jul 24, 2026. GPT-5.6 Sol came out Jul 9, 2026; Qwen3.6 Max Preview came out Apr 20, 2026. Knowledge cutoff: GPT-5.6 Sol Feb 16, 2026, Qwen3.6 Max Preview Apr 2025, Claude Opus 5 May 2026.
How do you decide the winner?
Each model gets a 0–100 score on capability (50%, independent benchmark results); price (25%, blended price per million tokens (3 input : 1 output), log scale); inputs & features (15%, image, PDF, audio and video input, tool calling, structured output and reasoning); context window (10%, maximum tokens per request, log scale). Dimensions missing for any model are dropped and the remaining weights rescaled, so every model is judged on the same evidence. Specs and prices come from public model listings and the labs’ own API pages; capability scores come from independent benchmark runs. Data updated Oct 4, 2026.
