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Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Qwen3 Max vs Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking

Too close to call on our weighted score (Claude Haiku 4.5 48, Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking 48, Qwen3 Max 31). The right pick depends on what you value most.

  1. Anthropic

    Claude Haiku 4.5

    Released Oct 15, 2025

    48/100
    • ECI142.4
    • Price$1.00 / $5.00
    • Context200K
    Full specs Remove Claude Haiku 4.5

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 Max

    Released Sep 23, 2025

    31/100
    • ECI142.4
    • Price$1.20 / $6.00
    • Context262K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 Max

  3. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking

    Released Sep 23, 2025

    48/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.40 / $4.00
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking
01 — Verdict

Too close to call

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (Claude Haiku 4.5 48/100, Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking 48/100, Qwen3 Max 31/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking on price and Qwen3 Max for long inputs. The score weighs price 50%, inputs & features 30%, context window 20%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.

  • CapabilityNot enough dataNo independent benchmark covers every model here yet
  • Lowest priceQwen3 VL 235B A22B ThinkingQwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking $1.30 · 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 VL 235B A22B Thinking 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsClaude Haiku 4.5Claude Haiku 4.5: Text, Images, PDFs · Qwen3 Max: Text · Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking: Text, Images
  • Self-hostingQwen3 VL 235B A22B ThinkingPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightClaude Haiku 4.5Qwen3 MaxQwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking
Price50%363244
Inputs & features30%802570
Context window20%323724
Overall100%48/10031/10048/100

Left out because at least one model lacks the data: capability. The remaining weights were rescaled.

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 Max vs Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking specifications side by side
SpecificationClaude Haiku 4.5AnthropicQwen3 MaxAlibaba (Qwen)Qwen3 VL 235B A22B ThinkingAlibaba (Qwen)
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)142.4 (best)142.4—
ECI rank#90 of 148 (best)#91 of 148—
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions71.2%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$1.20$0.40 (best)
Output$5.00$6.00$4.00 (best)
Cached input$0.10——
Blended (3:1)$2.00$2.40$1.30 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Anthropic APIOfficial Alibaba APIMedian of 9 providers
Limits
Context window200,000 tokens262,144 tokens (best)131,072 tokens
Max output64,000 tokens65,536 tokens (best)32,768 tokens
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesYesNoYes
PDFsYesNoNo
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningYesNoYes
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputYesNoYes
Availability
WeightsProprietaryProprietaryOpen
API model IDclaude-haiku-4-5qwen3-max—
API providers34 (best)169
ReleasedOct 15, 2025Sep 23, 2025Sep 23, 2025
Knowledge cutoffFeb 28, 2025Apr 2025Mar 31, 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 Max$24.00
  • Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking$12.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

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

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (Claude Haiku 4.5 48/100, Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking 48/100, Qwen3 Max 31/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking on price and Qwen3 Max for long inputs. The score weighs price 50%, inputs & features 30%, context window 20%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.

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

Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking is cheaper at $0.40 input / $4.00 output per million tokens (median across 9 API providers). 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 $1.30 per million tokens for Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking versus $2.00 for Claude Haiku 4.5 (1.5× as much) and $2.40 for Qwen3 Max (1.8× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. Claude Haiku 4.5 has an ECI of 142.4, Qwen3 Max has an ECI of 142.4 and Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking has not been scored yet.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Claude Haiku 4.5, Qwen3 Max and Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. Test both on a sample of your own tasks. 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 VL 235B A22B Thinking. Maximum output per response: Claude Haiku 4.5 up to 64,000, Qwen3 Max up to 65,536, Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking up to 32,768 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

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

Are any of these open source?

Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking 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 VL 235B A22B Thinking came out Sep 23, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Claude Haiku 4.5 Feb 28, 2025, Qwen3 Max Apr 2025, Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking Mar 31, 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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