Compare / Anthropic vs Z.ai

AI labs compared · October 2026

Anthropic vs Z.ai: which AI lab is ahead?

Each lab's best model on sale goes head to head on every kind of work we measure, from our own benchmarks and licensed sources. 27 models in all; a lab is only as good as the model you would actually pick from it.

16 models on sale with our resultsAnthropic Best: Claude Opus 5.5 · newest: Claude Haiku 5.5
11 models on sale with our resultsZ.ai Best: GLM-5.3 · newest: GLM-5.3-Flash
Anthropic wins 8Z.ai wins 0

Kinds of work led by each lab's best model there, of the 8 both are measured on.

Results as of 8 October 2026 (catalogue release 2026-10-08-4199ce0620fe). Models on sale means listed on OpenRouter today.

Anthropic or Z.ai? The short answer

Anthropic is ahead: its best models beat Z.ai's in all 8 kinds of work both are measured on.

  • Pick Anthropic for product listings, marketing planning, agents and tool use, professional work, reasoning and knowledge, writing, sticking to the facts and speed under pressure.
  • On our overall leaderboard, Claude Opus 5.5 is #1 (85 of 100) and GLM-5.3 is #16 (38).
  • Prices start at $0.20 per million tokens for Anthropic (Claude Haiku 5.5) and $0.15 for Z.ai (GLM-4.7-Flash).

Head to head

85Claude Opus 5.5
Best Spring Prompt overall score
38GLM-5.3
57.6Claude Opus 5.5
Best Intelligence Index
44.8GLM-5.3
$8.00Claude Opus 5.5
Flagship price, per million tokens
$2.15GLM-5.3
$0.20Claude Haiku 5.5
Cheapest model, per million tokens
$0.15GLM-4.7-Flash
16
Models on sale with our results
11

Each line names the model behind the number. Prices are blended, three input tokens to one output, at the developer's list price where we have read it; see every model's price. Intelligence Index from Artificial Analysis; overall score from our leaderboard.

Which lab is better for what

For each kind of work, each lab's best model there and its rank among every model on sale. Further right is better; the better rank is in green.

Product listingsTurning a sparse product feed and photos into listings that can go live 6 of 20Claude Opus 5.5 19 of 20GLM-5V-Turbo
Decks from an analysisTurning a finished analysis into a deck you could present as it is 4 of 19Claude Sonnet 5.5 not measured
User surveysPlanning a user survey and reading its results without being misled 2 of 8Claude Opus 5.5 not measured
Marketing planningPlanning a year of ad spend without overspending 4 of 19Claude Sonnet 5.5 16 of 19GLM-5.3
Agents and tool useMulti-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls 1 of 164Claude Sonnet 5.5 11 of 164GLM-5.3
Professional workReal tasks from banking, consulting and law, business documents and freelance projects 1 of 51Claude Sonnet 5.5 15 of 51GLM-5.3
Reasoning and knowledgeHard questions across science, maths and general knowledge 1 of 198Claude Opus 5.5 25 of 198GLM-5.3
WritingWhat people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality 1 of 188Claude Fable 5 23 of 188GLM-5.3
Sticking to the factsSummarising without inventing things, and factual answers 2 of 152Claude Opus 5.5 30 of 152GLM-5.3-Flash
Speed under pressureGood decisions against a real clock (fast chess) 15 of 22Claude Haiku 5.5 19 of 22GLM-5.3

Every model, by intelligence and price

Each dot is a model on sale with an Intelligence Index from Artificial Analysis. Up is smarter; left is cheaper. Hover or tap a dot for its name.

AnthropicZ.ai

020406080 $0.1$1$10$100 Price per million tokens, blended (log scale) Intelligence Index Claude Opus 5.5Claude Fable 5.1Claude Sonnet 5.5Claude Opus 5Claude Fable 5GLM-5.3

On our overall leaderboard

The 7 of their models we rank overall: one score out of 100 across everything we publish (how the score works). Only models with enough of our own results are ranked.

  1. #1Claude Opus 5.585
  2. #5Claude Fable 5.166
  3. #7Claude Sonnet 5.564
  4. #13Claude Haiku 5.544
  5. #16GLM-5.338
  6. #21GLM-5V-Turbo11
  7. #22Claude Haiku 4.57

Benchmark by benchmark

The headline result of every benchmark both labs have models on: each lab's best model and its rank among the models on sale. Green marks the better rank.

MeasureAnthropicZ.ai
Agents and tool use
τ²-bench · Task success (pass^1) · tau2 v1.0.1, retail% of tasks, higher is better 79.6%Claude Opus 4.5 · 3 of 673.7%GLM-5 · 5 of 6
τ²-bench · Task success (pass^1) · tau2 v1.0.1, airline% of tasks, higher is better 84.0%Claude Opus 4.5 · 1 of 682.5%GLM-5 · 3 of 6
τ²-bench · Task success (pass^1) · tau2 v1.0.1, telecom% of tasks, higher is better 92.3%Claude Opus 4.5 · 2 of 686.8%GLM-5 · 5 of 6
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) V4 · Overall accuracy · BFCL% correct, higher is better 77.5%Claude Opus 4.5 · 1 of 3872.4%GLM-4.6 · 3 of 38
OpenHands Index · Average% resolved, higher is better 81.0%Claude Fable 5 · 1 of 3358.2%GLM-5.1 · 12 of 33
Artificial Analysis · Terminal-Bench 4.0% of tasks, higher is better 63.6%Claude Sonnet 5.5 · 1 of 10541.9%GLM-5.3 · 9 of 105
Artificial Analysis · Terminal-Bench 2.1% of tasks, higher is better 91.4%Claude Fable 5.1 · 1 of 11584.3%GLM-5.3-Flash · 14 of 115
Artificial Analysis · τ-bench banking% of tasks, higher is better 47.2%Claude Fable 5.1 · 7 of 11350.3%GLM-5.3 · 3 of 113
Vending-Bench 2 · Money after a yearUS dollars, higher is better $11,182Claude Opus 5 · 3 of 56$8,314GLM-5.2 · 7 of 56
Marketing planning
ROASBench · Overall scorescore out of 100, higher is better 52.0Claude Sonnet 5.5 · 4 of 1924.8GLM-5.3 · 16 of 19
Product listings
CatalogBench · Reliably publish-ready% of products, higher is better 55.4%Claude Opus 5.5 · 5 of 201.8%GLM-5V-Turbo · 19 of 20
CatalogBench · Reliably publish-ready · sales brief% of products, higher is better 21.4%Claude Opus 5.5 · 7 of 200.0%GLM-5V-Turbo · 18 of 20
Professional work
APEX-Agents · Tasks passed% of tasks, higher is better 75.5%Claude Sonnet 5.5 · 1 of 3756.6%GLM-5.3 · 13 of 37
GDP.pdf · Professional document tasks% of rubric, higher is better 30.6%Claude Opus 5.5 · 2 of 3114.0%GLM-5.3-Flash · 24 of 31
Reasoning and knowledge
Artificial Analysis · Artificial Analysis Intelligence Indexindex score, higher is better 57.6Claude Opus 5.5 · 1 of 19844.8GLM-5.3 · 14 of 198
Artificial Analysis · Humanity's Last Exam% of questions, higher is better 61.4%Claude Opus 5.5 · 1 of 19742.3%GLM-5.3 · 30 of 197
Artificial Analysis · GPQA Diamond% of questions, higher is better 93.7%Claude Fable 5.1 · 8 of 18791.7%GLM-5.3 · 24 of 187
Speed under pressure
BulletBench · Ladder Elo · Bullet 60sladder Elo, higher is better 445Claude Haiku 4.5 · 10 of 2033GLM-5.3 · 17 of 20
Sticking to the facts
Vectara Hallucination Leaderboard · Hallucination rate · Vectara% of summaries, lower is better 9.8%Claude Haiku 4.5 · 43 of 799.3%GLM-4.7-Flash · 35 of 79
Arena (formerly LMArena) · Overall · Text factualityArena rating, higher is better 1,507Claude Opus 5.5 · 1 of 1131,467GLM-5.3 · 24 of 113
SimpleQA Verified (Epoch AI) · Correct answers% of questions, higher is better 72.2%Claude Opus 5.5 · 4 of 7341.0%GLM-5.3 · 41 of 73
Writing
Arena (formerly LMArena) · Overall · TextArena rating, higher is better 1,505Claude Opus 4.6 · 1 of 1661,478GLM-5.3 · 21 of 166
UGI Leaderboard · Writing score · UGIscore out of 100, higher is better 74.2Claude Fable 5 · 3 of 13867.0GLM-5.2 · 18 of 138

Their models, one against one

Quick answers

Is Anthropic or Z.ai better?

Anthropic is ahead: its best models beat Z.ai's in all 8 kinds of work both are measured on.

What is Anthropic's best model?

Claude Opus 5.5: #1 on the Spring Prompt overall leaderboard and 57.6 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.

What is Z.ai's best model?

GLM-5.3: #16 on the Spring Prompt overall leaderboard and 44.8 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.

Which is better for agents and tool use, Anthropic or Z.ai?

Anthropic: its best model there, Claude Sonnet 5.5, ranks 1 of 164 models on sale, against 11 for Z.ai's GLM-5.3.

Which is better for reasoning and knowledge, Anthropic or Z.ai?

Anthropic: its best model there, Claude Opus 5.5, ranks 1 of 198 models on sale, against 25 for Z.ai's GLM-5.3.

Which is better for writing, Anthropic or Z.ai?

Anthropic: its best model there, Claude Fable 5, ranks 1 of 188 models on sale, against 23 for Z.ai's GLM-5.3.

Which is cheaper, Anthropic or Z.ai?

Z.ai's cheapest model with results, GLM-4.7-Flash, costs $0.15 per million tokens (three input to one output), against $0.20 for Claude Haiku 5.5 from Anthropic.

Other labs compared

Which model is best for your product?

Benchmarks aren't your data. We test the models from Anthropic, Z.ai and the rest on your own tasks, with the cost of every answer.

Talk to usSee the leaderboard