Claude Opus 5.5 vs Gemini 3 Flash
Verdict
- Claude Opus 5.5 (thinking) leads on quality: 70.7 vs 60.0.
- Claude Opus 5.5 (thinking) is stronger in composite, knowledge, long context, multimodal, reasoning.
- Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) is stronger in agents & tools, instruction following.
- Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) is 7.1× cheaper ($1.13 vs $8.00 per 1M blended).
- Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) streams 4.5× faster (215 vs 48 tokens per second).
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (thinking) | Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) |
|---|---|---|
| BenchLeader Index | 70.7 | 60.0 |
| Composite score | 95.0 | 61.3 |
| Knowledge score | 85.0 | 68.1 |
| Long context score | 68.5 | 65.1 |
| Multimodal score | 71.9 | 64.0 |
| Reasoning score | 95.0 | 57.5 |
| Agents & tools score | – | 55.1 |
| Instruction following score | – | 75.6 |
| Blended price $/M | $8.00 | $1.13 |
| Output speed | 48 tok/s | 215 tok/s |
| Time to first answer | 4.2 s | 6.2 s |
| Context window | 1M | 1.0M |
| AA Intelligence Index | 57.6 | 26.3 |
| IFBench | – | 78.0% |
| AA-LCR | 84.7% | 78.0% |
| MMMU-Pro | 87.7% | 79.9% |
| AA-Omniscience | 46.4 | 10.1 |
| Terminal-Bench Hard | – | 38.6% |
| GPQA Diamond (AA) | – | 89.8% |
| Humanity's Last Exam (AA) | 61.4% | 36.6% |
| SciCode (AA) | 66.9% | – |
| τ²-Bench Telecom (AA) | – | 80.4% |
| CritPt | 31.7% | 8.6% |
| GDPval (AA) | 67.3% | – |
| τ²-Bench Banking (AA) | – | 20.8% |
| APEX-Agents (AA) | – | 27.7% |
| Terminal-Bench 4.0 (AA) | 59.6% | – |
| AutomationBench | 69.5% | – |
| GDP.pdf | 26.2% | – |
| Harvey LAB | 91.2% | – |
| AA-Omniscience: accuracy | 66.2% | 53.4% |
| AA-Omniscience: non-hallucination | 41.4% | 7.0% |
| AA-Briefcase | 1822 | – |
Data as of 2026-09-22. Best configuration of each model; every score links to its source on the model pages.
Claude Opus 5.5 vs Gemini 3 Flash: questions
- Is Claude Opus 5.5 better than Gemini 3 Flash?
- Claude Opus 5.5 (thinking) leads on quality: 70.7 vs 60.0. The BenchLeader Index combines every independent quality benchmark; Claude Opus 5.5 (thinking) is ahead overall as of 2026-09-22, but check the category scores for your use.
- Which is cheaper, Claude Opus 5.5 or Gemini 3 Flash?
- Gemini 3 Flash is cheaper: $1.13 against $8.00 per million tokens, blended at three input tokens per output token.
- Which is faster, Claude Opus 5.5 or Gemini 3 Flash?
- Gemini 3 Flash streams faster: 215 against 48 output tokens per second.
- Which has the larger context window?
- Gemini 3 Flash accepts more context: 1.0M against 1M tokens.