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Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Qwen3 Max vs o3

Too close to call on our weighted score (o3 58, Claude Sonnet 4.5 55, Qwen3 Max 50). The right pick depends on what you value most.

  1. Anthropic

    Claude Sonnet 4.5

    Released Sep 29, 2025

    55/100
    • ECI146.8
    • Price$3.00 / $15.00
    • Context200K
    Full specs Remove Claude Sonnet 4.5

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 Max

    Released Sep 23, 2025

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

  3. OpenAI

    o3

    Released Apr 16, 2025

    58/100
    • ECI146.9
    • Price$2.00 / $8.00
    • Context200K
    Full specs Remove o3
01 — Verdict

Too close to call

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within 3 points (o3 58/100, Claude Sonnet 4.5 55/100, Qwen3 Max 50/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: o3 for raw capability, Qwen3 Max on price and Qwen3 Max for long inputs. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • Capabilityo3Capabilities Index (ECI): o3 146.9 · Claude Sonnet 4.5 146.8 · Qwen3 Max 142.4
  • Lowest priceQwen3 MaxQwen3 Max $2.40 · o3 $3.50 · Claude Sonnet 4.5 $6.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextQwen3 MaxQwen3 Max 262,144 · Claude Sonnet 4.5 200,000 · o3 200,000 tokens
  • Widest inputsClaude Sonnet 4.5 and o3Claude Sonnet 4.5: Text, Images, PDFs · Qwen3 Max: Text · o3: Text, Images, PDFs
  • Self-hostingNo open weightsAll three are available only through APIs
How the score is built
MeasureWeightClaude Sonnet 4.5Qwen3 Maxo3
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%746874
Price25%133224
Inputs & features15%802580
Context window10%323732
Overall100%55/10050/10058/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Qwen3 Max vs o3 specifications side by side
SpecificationClaude Sonnet 4.5AnthropicQwen3 MaxAlibaba (Qwen)o3OpenAI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)146.8142.4146.9 (best)
ECI rank#64 of 148#91 of 148#63 of 148 (best)
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions82.3% (best)72.6%81.8%
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics23.9%19.0%33.3% (best)
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics77.8%73.3%84.4% (best)
SWE-bench VerifiedFixing real GitHub issues71.3% (best)—62.3%
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions30.7%48.8%49.4% (best)
Price per million tokens
Input$3.00$1.20 (best)$2.00
Output$15.00$6.00 (best)$8.00
Cached input$0.30 (best)—$0.50
Blended (3:1)$6.00$2.40 (best)$3.50
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Anthropic APIOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial OpenAI API
Limits
Context window200,000 tokens262,144 tokens (best)200,000 tokens
Max output64,000 tokens65,536 tokens100,000 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesYesNoYes
PDFsYesNoYes
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningYesNoYeslow · medium · high
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputYesNoYes
Availability
WeightsProprietaryProprietaryProprietary
API model IDclaude-sonnet-4-5qwen3-maxo3
API providers28 (best)1618
ReleasedSep 29, 2025Sep 23, 2025Apr 16, 2025
Knowledge cutoffJul 31, 2025Apr 2025May 2024
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 Sonnet 4.5$60.00
  • Qwen3 Max$24.00
  • o3$36.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Claude Sonnet 4.5, Qwen3 Max or o3?

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within 3 points (o3 58/100, Claude Sonnet 4.5 55/100, Qwen3 Max 50/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: o3 for raw capability, Qwen3 Max on price and Qwen3 Max for long inputs. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 4.5, Qwen3 Max or o3?

Qwen3 Max is cheaper at $1.20 input / $6.00 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). o3 costs $2.00 input / $8.00 output per million tokens (official OpenAI API price); Claude Sonnet 4.5 costs $3.00 input / $15.00 output per million tokens (official Anthropic API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $2.40 per million tokens for Qwen3 Max versus $3.50 for o3 (1.5× as much) and $6.00 for Claude Sonnet 4.5 (2.5× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

o3 scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): o3 146.9 (#63 of 148), Claude Sonnet 4.5 146.8 (#64 of 148) and Qwen3 Max 142.4 (#91 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (144.9–148.6 vs 145.3–148.5), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Claude Sonnet 4.5 82.3%, o3 81.8%, Qwen3 Max 72.6%; FrontierMath Tiers 1–3 — o3 33.3%, Claude Sonnet 4.5 23.9%, Qwen3 Max 19.0%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — o3 84.4%, Claude Sonnet 4.5 77.8%, Qwen3 Max 73.3%; SimpleQA Verified — o3 49.4%, Qwen3 Max 48.8%, Claude Sonnet 4.5 30.7%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Qwen3 Max yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, o3 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 Sonnet 4.5 and 200,000 for o3. Maximum output per response: Claude Sonnet 4.5 up to 64,000, Qwen3 Max up to 65,536, o3 up to 100,000 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Claude Sonnet 4.5 accepts text, images and PDFs; Qwen3 Max accepts text; o3 accepts text, images and PDFs. Claude Sonnet 4.5 handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

No. Claude Sonnet 4.5, Qwen3 Max and o3 are proprietary and only available through APIs and apps.

Which is newer?

Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the newest, released Sep 29, 2025. Qwen3 Max came out Sep 23, 2025; o3 came out Apr 16, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Claude Sonnet 4.5 Jul 31, 2025, Qwen3 Max Apr 2025, o3 May 2024.

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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