Compare / Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs MiniMax M3.1 Flash

Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs MiniMax M3.1 Flash

Which is cheaper, which is more capable, and which does better at each kind of work, from 64 results on 4 sources that measured both models.

AnthropicClaude Sonnet 5.5 Released 28 Sep 2026 · $2.00 in · $10.00 out
MiniMaxMiniMax M3.1 Flash Released 19 Oct 2026 · $0.15 in · $0.60 out
Claude Sonnet 5.5 wins 415 too close to callMiniMax M3.1 Flash wins 18

Of the 64 results both models have, the better value on each. Results whose reported ranges overlap are too close to call.

Results as of 20 October 2026 (catalogue release 2026-10-20-96eb40c3ec63). See also Anthropic vs MiniMax, every model from both labs.

Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash? The short answer

Pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 if quality matters most: it scores higher (Spring Prompt overall 63 against 47). Pick MiniMax M3.1 Flash if cost matters more: it costs 15 times less per token.

  • Spring Prompt overall: Claude Sonnet 5.5 63, MiniMax M3.1 Flash 47 (out of 100; how the score works).
  • MiniMax M3.1 Flash is cheaper: $0.26 against $4.00 per million tokens, 15 times less.
  • Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index: 56.0 against 42.4.
  • MiniMax M3.1 Flash is newer: released 19 Oct 2026, against 28 Sep 2026 for Claude Sonnet 5.5.
  • On our own benchmarks, on the results both models have: Claude Sonnet 5.5 does better for decks from an analysis and marketing planning; MiniMax M3.1 Flash for product listings.
  • On third-party benchmarks, on the results both models have: Claude Sonnet 5.5 does better for agents and tool use and reasoning and knowledge.

Head to head

63
Spring Prompt overall
47
56.0
Intelligence Index
42.4
$4.00
Price per million tokens, blendedlower is better
$0.26
137
Output speed, tokens a second
159
1,000,000
Context window, tokens
1,048,576

Every fact side by side

Claude Sonnet 5.5MiniMax M3.1 Flash
Price per million tokens$2.00 in · $10.00 out$0.15 in · $0.60 out
Blended (3 in : 1 out)$4.00$0.26
Cheapest host, blended$4.00 (Amazon Bedrock)–
Cached input, per million$0.20 cached input$0.015 cached input
Intelligence Index56.042.4
Spring Prompt overall6347
Output speed, tokens a second137159
Context window1,000,000 tokens1,048,576 tokens
Released28 Sep 202619 Oct 2026 (newer)
WeightsClosedClosed
Developer based inthe USChina

Prices are the developer's list price where we have read it, otherwise the typical host on OpenRouter; see every model's price. Intelligence and speed from Artificial Analysis.

Which is better for what

Each model's rank among the models on sale today, for each kind of work, from our own benchmarks and licensed sources. Further right is better; the better rank is in green.

Product listingsTurning a sparse product feed and photos into listings that can go live 13 of 24 7 of 24
Decks from an analysisTurning a finished analysis into a deck you could present as it is 5 of 24 14 of 24
User surveysPlanning a user survey and reading its results without being misled not measured 13 of 13
Marketing planningPlanning a year of ad spend without overspending 4 of 24 12 of 24
Agents and tool useMulti-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls 1 of 168 32 of 168
Professional workReal tasks from banking, consulting and law, business documents and freelance projects 1 of 51 not measured
Reasoning and knowledgeHard questions across science, maths and general knowledge 2 of 202 18 of 202
WritingWhat people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality 33 of 189 not measured
Sticking to the factsSummarising without inventing things, and factual answers 43 of 153 not measured
Speed under pressureGood decisions against a real clock (fast chess) 24 of 27 not measured

From our research

Every shared result

Each model's best result on every measure both have, grouped by benchmark, with the setting that produced it. Under each measure, every model that benchmark has measured is a grey tick, best to the right, so you can see where the two sit in the field. The headline measures of each benchmark come first; the rest are under "Show all". Green marks the better value; where a source reports ranges that overlap, neither is marked.

MeasureClaude Sonnet 5.5MiniMax M3.1 Flash
CatalogBench measured by Spring Prompt · 3 results
Cost per productUS dollars, lower is better 16 · 1 of 24 measured $0.0172 $0
Reliably publish-ready% of products, higher is better 15 · 9 of 24 measured 32.1% 50.0%
Reliably publish-ready · sales brief% of products, higher is better 12 · 6 of 24 measured 10.7% 37.5%
DeckBench measured by Spring Prompt · 3 results
Cost per deckUS dollars, lower is better 16 · 1 of 24 measured $0.15 $0
Deck ratingrating, higher is betterThe rating weighs each win by how strong the other deck was; the win rate counts wins against whichever decks a model happened to meet, so the two can disagree. 5 · 14 of 24 measured 1,408 1,090
Accurate decks% of tasks, higher is better 6 · 9 of 24 measured 66.7% 50.0%
ROASBench measured by Spring Prompt · 3 results
Overall scorescore out of 100, higher is better 4 · 12 of 24 measured 52.0 40.3
Audience scorescore out of 100, higher is better 11 · 12 of 24 measured 61.8 60.8
Business scorescore out of 100, higher is better 2 · 10 of 24 measured 57.2 38.9
Artificial Analysis reported by Artificial Analysis · 3 results
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Indexindex score, higher is better 2 · 21 of 249 measured 56.0max reasoning 42.4
Humanity's Last Exam% of questions, higher is better 5 · 14 of 248 measured 55.0%max reasoning 48.0%
Terminal-Bench 4.0% of tasks, higher is better 1 · 22 of 118 measured 63.6%max reasoning 25.8%
Show all 64 results (52 more)
MeasureClaude Sonnet 5.5MiniMax M3.1 Flash
CatalogBench measured by Spring Prompt · 28 results
Channel compliance% of products, higher is better 17 · 1 of 24 measured 99.4% 100.0%
Channel rules broken% of products, lower is better 19 · 12 of 24 measured 1.2% 0.6%
Channel rules broken · sales brief% of products, lower is better 12 · 1 of 24 measured 0.6% 0.0%
Claims to check% of products, lower is better 1 · 1 of 24 measured 0.0% 0.0%
Claims to check · sales brief% of products, lower is better 14 · 1 of 24 measured 0.6% 0.0%
Conflicts caught% of conflicts, higher is better 1 · 1 of 24 measured 100.0% 100.0%
Content quality% of checks, higher is better 15 · 17 of 24 measured 96.5% 95.8%
Content quality · sales brief% of checks, higher is better 11 · 17 of 24 measured 97.3% 96.0%
Decision accuracy% of decisions, higher is better 15 · 16 of 24 measured 95.7% 95.6%
Failed outputs% of products, lower is better 1 · 22 of 24 measured 0.0% 1.8%
Failed outputs · sales brief% of products, lower is better 1 · 22 of 24 measured 0.0% 1.8%
Field accuracy% of missing fields, higher is better 21 · 19 of 24 measured 91.5% 92.0%
Invented values% of filled values, lower is better 7 · 22 of 24 measured 0.8% 3.8%
Missing UK information% of products, lower is better 1 · 1 of 24 measured 0.0% 0.0%
Missing UK information · sales brief% of products, lower is better 1 · 1 of 24 measured 0.0% 0.0%
Not findable% of products, lower is better 1 · 16 of 24 measured 1.2% 7.1%
Not findable · sales brief% of products, lower is better 1 · 12 of 24 measured 0.6% 4.2%
Publish-ready listings% of products, higher is better 17 · 11 of 24 measured 46.4% 63.1%
Publish-ready listings · sales brief% of products, higher is better 13 · 7 of 24 measured 27.4% 57.1%
Time per productseconds, lower is better 8 · 19 of 24 measured 9.90 32.0
Unsupported claimsclaims per product, lower is better 17 · 6 of 24 measured 1.08 0.39
Unsupported claims% of products, lower is better 19 · 5 of 24 measured 39.3% 7.7%
Unsupported claims · sales briefclaims per product, lower is better 12 · 6 of 24 measured 1.71 0.60
Unsupported claims · sales brief% of products, lower is better 11 · 5 of 24 measured 59.5% 16.1%
Wrong attributes% of products, lower is better 15 · 20 of 24 measured 19.1% 22.6%
Wrong attributes · sales brief% of products, lower is better 18 · 20 of 24 measured 20.8% 21.4%
Wrong category or variant% of products, lower is better 15 · 20 of 24 measured 3.0% 4.2%
Wrong category or variant · sales brief% of products, lower is better 16 · 21 of 24 measured 3.0% 4.8%
DeckBench measured by Spring Prompt · 14 results
Caveat dropped% of tasks, lower is better 12 · 24 of 24 measured 16.7% 33.3%
Clean layout% of tasks, higher is better 1 · 23 of 24 measured 100.0% 0.0%
Design quality% of the maximum, higher is better 4 · 21 of 24 measured 78.5% 46.2%
Draft figure quoted% of tasks, lower is better 1 · 12 of 24 measured 0.0% 33.3%
Findings missing% of tasks, lower is better 1 · 24 of 24 measured 0.0% 50.0%
Head-to-head win rate% of comparisons, higher is betterThe rating weighs each win by how strong the other deck was; the win rate counts wins against whichever decks a model happened to meet, so the two can disagree. 4 · 15 of 24 measured 85.6% 48.6%
Layout defects% of tasks, lower is better 1 · 23 of 24 measured 0.0% 100.0%
Misleading metric used% of tasks, lower is better 1 · 24 of 24 measured 0.0% 33.3%
Presentable decks% of tasks, higher is better 2 · 12 of 24 measured 50.0% 0.0%
Recommendation late or wrong% of tasks, lower is better 9 · 13 of 24 measured 16.7% 33.3%
Slides needing work% of tasks, lower is better 7 · 21 of 24 measured 33.3% 83.3%
Time per deckseconds, lower is better 10 · 20 of 24 measured 83.4 330
Unsupported claims% of tasks, lower is better 1 · 21 of 24 measured 0.0% 50.0%
Unsupported numbers% of tasks, lower is better 1 · 24 of 24 measured 0.0% 50.0%
ROASBench measured by Spring Prompt · 6 results
Consistency scorescore out of 100, higher is better 10 · 17 of 24 measured 28.5 17.3
Contribution profitsimulated US dollars, higher is better 11 · 5 of 24 measured $571,203 $693,379
Cost of a runUS dollars, lower is better 16 · 1 of 24 measured $0.42 $0
Months over budgetmonths of 12, lower is better 1 · 1 of 24 measured 0 0
Planning scorescore out of 100, higher is better 3 · 21 of 24 measured 55.1 54.2
Return on ad spendprofit per $1 spent, higher is better 1 · 9 of 24 measured $0.70 $0.52
Artificial Analysis reported by Artificial Analysis · 4 results
Long-context reasoning (AA-LCR)% of questions, higher is better 19 · 45 of 239 measured 82.7%max reasoning 79.7%
Output speedtokens per second, higher is better 33 · 21 of 78 measured 137max reasoning 159
SciCode% of problems, higher is better 4 · 36 of 119 measured 61.0%max reasoning 53.4%
Time to first answer tokenseconds, lower is better 17 · 51 of 78 measured 0.71low reasoning 13.3

Quick answers

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 better than MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

Pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 if quality matters most: it scores higher (Spring Prompt overall 63 against 47). Pick MiniMax M3.1 Flash if cost matters more: it costs 15 times less per token.

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash is cheaper: $0.26 against $4.00 per million tokens, 15 times less.

Which is faster, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash writes about 159 tokens a second on its usual API, against 137 for Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Artificial Analysis).

Which is better for product listings, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash ranks 7 of 24 models on sale for turning a sparse product feed and photos into listings that can go live, against 13 for Claude Sonnet 5.5.

Which is better for decks from an analysis, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 ranks 5 of 24 models on sale for turning a finished analysis into a deck you could present as it is, against 14 for MiniMax M3.1 Flash.

Which is better for marketing planning, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 ranks 4 of 24 models on sale for planning a year of ad spend without overspending, against 12 for MiniMax M3.1 Flash.

Which is better for agents and tool use, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 ranks 1 of 168 models on sale for multi-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls, against 32 for MiniMax M3.1 Flash.

Which has the bigger context window, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash: 1,048,576 tokens, against 1,000,000 for Claude Sonnet 5.5.

Run Claude Sonnet 5.5 and MiniMax M3.1 Flash on your own prompt

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