Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs GPT-5.1 Instant: Specs & Benchmark Comparison
| Characteristic | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | GPT-5.1 Instant |
|---|---|---|
| Company | Anthropic | OpenAI |
| Release Date | February 17, 2026 | November 11, 2025 |
| Parameters | — | — |
| Multimodal | Yes | Yes |
| Context (input) | 200K | 256K |
| Context (output) | 64K | 32K |
| Input Price / 1M | $3.00 | $0.30 |
| Output Price / 1M | $15.00 | $1.20 |
| Average Score | 0.7 | 0.9 |
| Benchmarks | ||
| SWE-bench Verified | 0.8 | 0.8 |
| GPQA | 0.9 | 0.9 |
Visual Benchmark Comparison
Claude Sonnet 4.6
GPT-5.1 Instant
SWE-bench Verified0.8 vs 0.8
0.8
0.8
GPQA0.9 vs 0.9
0.9
0.9
Verdict
GPT-5.1 Instant leads in 2 out of 5 comparison categories.
Overall Performance
Both models show comparable average scores: Claude Sonnet 4.6 — 0.7, GPT-5.1 Instant — 0.9.
Programming
On SWE-Bench, both models are nearly equal: Claude Sonnet 4.6 — 0.8, GPT-5.1 Instant — 0.8.
API Cost
GPT-5.1 Instant is 12.0x cheaper: input $0.30/1M vs $3.00/1M tokens.
Context Window
GPT-5.1 Instant supports a larger context: 256K vs 200K tokens.
Recency
Claude Sonnet 4.6 is newer: released 2/17/2026 vs 11/11/2025.
More About These Models
Related Comparisons
The Claude Sonnet 4.6 and GPT-5.1 Instant comparison is updated for 2026. Data includes benchmark results, API pricing, context window size and other specifications. For more detailed information, visit the Claude Sonnet 4.6 or GPT-5.1 Instant page. See also the complete list of AI model comparisons.