Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct vs Gemini 2.5 Flash vs Claude Haiku 4.5
Gemini 2.5 Flash comes out ahead, 84 to 61 and 40 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.
ByteDance SeedSeed-OSS-36B-Instruct
40/100- ECI—
- Price—
- Context524K
- Our pick
GoogleGemini 2.5 Flash
84/100- ECI140.6
- Price$0.30 / $2.50
- Context1.05M
AnthropicClaude Haiku 4.5
61/100- ECI142.2
- Price$1.00 / $5.00
- Context200K
Gemini 2.5 Flash is our pick
Gemini 2.5 Flash is the better all-round choice, scoring 84/100 against Claude Haiku 4.5 (61) and Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct (40). It leads on inputs & features and context window. The score weighs inputs & features 60%, context window 40%. 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 priceGemini 2.5 FlashGemini 2.5 Flash $0.85 · Claude Haiku 4.5 $2.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend) · Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct unpriced
- Longest contextGemini 2.5 FlashGemini 2.5 Flash 1,048,576 · Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct 524,288 · Claude Haiku 4.5 200,000 tokens
- Widest inputsGemini 2.5 FlashSeed-OSS-36B-Instruct: Text · Gemini 2.5 Flash: Text, Images, PDFs, Audio, Video · Claude Haiku 4.5: Text, Images, PDFs
- Self-hostingSeed-OSS-36B-InstructPublishes downloadable weights (Apache 2.0)
| Measure | Weight | Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct | Gemini 2.5 Flash | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inputs & features | 60% | 35 | 100 | 80 |
| Context window | 40% | 49 | 61 | 32 |
| Overall | 100% | 40/100 | 84/100 | 61/100 |
Left out because at least one model lacks the data: capability and price. The remaining weights were rescaled.
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Seed-OSS-36B-InstructByteDance Seed | Gemini 2.5 FlashGoogle | Claude Haiku 4.5Anthropic |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | — | 140.6 | 142.2 (best) |
| ECI rank | — | #110 of 165 | #102 of 165 (best) |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 71.5% (best) | — | 71.2% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 67.5% (best) | — | 66.7% |
| SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions | — | — | 13.2% |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | — | $0.30 (best) | $1.00 |
| Output | — | $2.50 (best) | $5.00 |
| Cached input | — | $0.03 (best) | $0.10 |
| Blended (3:1) | — | $0.85 (best) | $2.00 |
| Long-context rate | — | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | — | Official Google API | Official Anthropic API |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 524,288 tokens | 1,048,576 tokens (best) | 200,000 tokens |
| Max output | 524,288 tokens (best) | 65,536 tokens | 64,000 tokens |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | No | Yes | Yes |
| PDFs | No | Yes | Yes |
| Audio | No | Yes | No |
| Video | No | Yes | No |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | No | Yes | Yes |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | OpenApache 2.0 | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| API model ID | — | gemini-2.5-flash | claude-haiku-4-5 |
| API providers | — | 32 | 48 (best) |
| Released | Aug 20, 2025 | Jun 17, 2025 | Oct 15, 2025 |
| Knowledge cutoff | Jul 2024 | Jan 2025 | Feb 28, 2025 |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct—
- Gemini 2.5 Flash$8.00
- Claude Haiku 4.5$20.00
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct, Gemini 2.5 Flash or Claude Haiku 4.5?
Gemini 2.5 Flash is the better all-round choice, scoring 84/100 against Claude Haiku 4.5 (61) and Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct (40). It leads on inputs & features and context window. The score weighs inputs & features 60%, context window 40%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.
Which is cheaper, Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct, Gemini 2.5 Flash or Claude Haiku 4.5?
Gemini 2.5 Flash is cheaper at $0.30 input / $2.50 output per million tokens (official Google API price). Claude Haiku 4.5 costs $1.00 input / $5.00 output per million tokens (official Anthropic API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.85 per million tokens for Gemini 2.5 Flash versus $2.00 for Claude Haiku 4.5 (2.4× as much). Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct has no published per-token price.
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct has not been scored yet, Gemini 2.5 Flash has an ECI of 140.6 and Claude Haiku 4.5 has an ECI of 142.2.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct, Gemini 2.5 Flash and Claude Haiku 4.5 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?
Gemini 2.5 Flash has the largest context window at 1,048,576 tokens, against 524,288 for Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct and 200,000 for Claude Haiku 4.5. Maximum output per response: Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct up to 524,288, Gemini 2.5 Flash up to 65,536, Claude Haiku 4.5 up to 64,000 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct accepts text; Gemini 2.5 Flash accepts text, images, PDFs, audio and video; Claude Haiku 4.5 accepts text, images and PDFs. Gemini 2.5 Flash handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct publishes its weights (Apache 2.0) and can be self-hosted; Gemini 2.5 Flash and Claude Haiku 4.5 is proprietary.
Which is newer?
Claude Haiku 4.5 is the newest, released Oct 15, 2025. Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct came out Aug 20, 2025; Gemini 2.5 Flash came out Jun 17, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Seed-OSS-36B-Instruct Jul 2024, Gemini 2.5 Flash Jan 2025, Claude Haiku 4.5 Feb 28, 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 Nov 2, 2026.
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