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Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Qwen3 235B-A22B vs Qwen3 Max

Claude Haiku 4.5 comes out ahead, 58 to 51 and 50 on our weighted score, though Qwen3 235B-A22B is 39% cheaper per token.

  1. Our pick

    Anthropic

    Claude Haiku 4.5

    Released Oct 15, 2025

    58/100
    • ECI142.4
    • Price$1.00 / $5.00
    • Context200K
    Full specs Remove Claude Haiku 4.5

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 235B-A22B

    Released Apr 28, 2025

    51/100
    • ECI139.4
    • Price$0.70 / $2.80
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 235B-A22B

  3. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 Max

    Released Sep 23, 2025

    50/100
    • ECI142.4
    • Price$1.20 / $6.00
    • Context262K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 Max
01 — Verdict

Claude Haiku 4.5 is our pick

Claude Haiku 4.5 is the better all-round choice, scoring 58/100 against Qwen3 235B-A22B (51) and Qwen3 Max (50). It leads on inputs & features. Qwen3 235B-A22B wins on price. Qwen3 Max wins on context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityClaude Haiku 4.5Capabilities Index (ECI): Claude Haiku 4.5 142.4 · Qwen3 Max 142.4 · Qwen3 235B-A22B 139.4
  • Lowest priceQwen3 235B-A22BQwen3 235B-A22B $1.23 · Claude Haiku 4.5 $2.00 · Qwen3 Max $2.40 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextQwen3 MaxQwen3 Max 262,144 · Claude Haiku 4.5 200,000 · Qwen3 235B-A22B 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsClaude Haiku 4.5Claude Haiku 4.5: Text, Images, PDFs · Qwen3 235B-A22B: Text · Qwen3 Max: Text
  • Self-hostingQwen3 235B-A22BPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightClaude Haiku 4.5Qwen3 235B-A22BQwen3 Max
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%696568
Price25%364632
Inputs & features15%803525
Context window10%322437
Overall100%58/10051/10050/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Qwen3 235B-A22B vs Qwen3 Max specifications side by side
SpecificationClaude Haiku 4.5AnthropicQwen3 235B-A22BAlibaba (Qwen)Qwen3 MaxAlibaba (Qwen)
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)142.4 (best)139.4142.4
ECI rank#90 of 148 (best)#103 of 148#91 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions71.2%70.7%72.6% (best)
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics——19.0%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics66.7%—73.3% (best)
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions13.2%—48.8% (best)
Price per million tokens
Input$1.00$0.70 (best)$1.20
Output$5.00$2.80 (best)$6.00
Cached input$0.10——
Blended (3:1)$2.00$1.23 (best)$2.40
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Anthropic APIOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial Alibaba API
Limits
Context window200,000 tokens131,072 tokens262,144 tokens (best)
Max output64,000 tokens16,384 tokens65,536 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesYesNoNo
PDFsYesNoNo
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningYesYesNo
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputYesNoNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpenProprietary
API model IDclaude-haiku-4-5qwen3-235b-a22bqwen3-max
API providers34 (best)716
ReleasedOct 15, 2025Apr 28, 2025Sep 23, 2025
Knowledge cutoffFeb 28, 2025Apr 2025Apr 2025
03 — Cost

What would a month cost?

Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.

  • Claude Haiku 4.5$20.00
  • Qwen3 235B-A22B$12.60
  • Qwen3 Max$24.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Claude Haiku 4.5, Qwen3 235B-A22B or Qwen3 Max?

Claude Haiku 4.5 is the better all-round choice, scoring 58/100 against Qwen3 235B-A22B (51) and Qwen3 Max (50). It leads on inputs & features. Qwen3 235B-A22B wins on price. Qwen3 Max wins on context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Claude Haiku 4.5, Qwen3 235B-A22B or Qwen3 Max?

Qwen3 235B-A22B is cheaper at $0.70 input / $2.80 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). Claude Haiku 4.5 costs $1.00 input / $5.00 output per million tokens (official Anthropic API price); Qwen3 Max costs $1.20 input / $6.00 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $1.23 per million tokens for Qwen3 235B-A22B versus $2.00 for Claude Haiku 4.5 (1.6× as much) and $2.40 for Qwen3 Max (2× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Claude Haiku 4.5 scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Claude Haiku 4.5 142.4 (#90 of 148), Qwen3 Max 142.4 (#91 of 148) and Qwen3 235B-A22B 139.4 (#103 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (139.5–144.3 vs 140.0–144.6), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Qwen3 Max 72.6%, Claude Haiku 4.5 71.2%, Qwen3 235B-A22B 70.7%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Claude Haiku 4.5, Qwen3 235B-A22B and Qwen3 Max yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Claude Haiku 4.5 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?

Qwen3 Max has the largest context window at 262,144 tokens, against 200,000 for Claude Haiku 4.5 and 131,072 for Qwen3 235B-A22B. Maximum output per response: Claude Haiku 4.5 up to 64,000, Qwen3 235B-A22B up to 16,384, Qwen3 Max up to 65,536 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Claude Haiku 4.5 accepts text, images and PDFs; Qwen3 235B-A22B accepts text; Qwen3 Max accepts text. Claude Haiku 4.5 handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Qwen3 235B-A22B publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Claude Haiku 4.5 and Qwen3 Max is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Claude Haiku 4.5 is the newest, released Oct 15, 2025. Qwen3 Max came out Sep 23, 2025; Qwen3 235B-A22B came out Apr 28, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Claude Haiku 4.5 Feb 28, 2025, Qwen3 235B-A22B Apr 2025, Qwen3 Max Apr 2025.

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.

05 — Keep comparing

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