Claude 3 Opus vs Claude 3 Sonnet
How do these models stack up? Below is an expert side-by-side comparison of specifications, context window capacity, live pricing per million tokens, and standardized benchmark scores for Claude 3 Opus and Claude 3 Sonnet.
Claude 3 Opus
Claude 3 Opus is Anthropic's most powerful model from the first Claude 3 generation, engineered for deep analysis, comprehensive research, and demanding multi-step task execution. Released in March 2024, it represented the frontier of Anthropic's capabilities at the time, with a 200,000-token context window suitable for processing large documents, synthesizing diverse research sources, and generating expert-level written content. Priced at $15/MTok for input, Claude 3 Opus remains available for teams with specific requirements for Claude 3-generation behavior, though most use cases are better served by the improved Claude 4 series.
Claude 3 Sonnet
Claude 3 Sonnet was Anthropic's balanced standard model in the first Claude 3 generation, optimized for a combination of response speed and general-purpose capabilities across writing, summarization, and question answering. Released in March 2024 alongside Opus and Haiku, it occupied the mid-tier positioning in the Claude 3 lineup. Claude 3 Sonnet has since been deprecated, and current use cases requiring similar capability-to-cost balance are best served by the Claude 4 Sonnet series, which offers substantially improved reasoning, context handling, and instruction following at competitive pricing.
Technical Specifications
| Specification | Claude 3 Opus | Claude 3 Sonnet |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | Anthropic |
| Context Window | 200,000 tokens | 200,000 tokens |
| Agent Suitability | N/A | N/A |
| Time to First Token (TTFT) | N/A | N/A |
| Deployment Model | N/A | N/A |
| Production Stability | stable | stable |
| API Available | Yes | Yes |
| Released Date | 2024-03-04 | 2024-03-04 |
API Pricing Comparison
Input Price per Million Tokens
Claude 3 Opus
$15.00
Claude 3 Sonnet
$3.00
Output Price per Million Tokens
Claude 3 Opus
$75.00
Claude 3 Sonnet
$15.00
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Benchmark Performance Metrics
Scores show the raw performance percentages verified across key evaluation suites. Higher bars indicate superior accuracy and capability in that domain.
Claude 3 Opus Quirks & Gotchas
No developer gotchas reported.
Claude 3 Sonnet Quirks & Gotchas
No developer gotchas reported.