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Claude Opus 5 vs Gemini 3 Flash

Full profiles: Claude Opus 5 (Anthropic) and Gemini 3 Flash (Google): every benchmark, price and rank.

Updated · Data from 11 sources

As of 29 Oct 2026, Claude Opus 5 is ahead of Gemini 3 Flash on quality (65.4 vs 59.0 on the BenchLeader Index), but Gemini 3 Flash is 8.9× cheaper at $1.13 vs $10.00 per 1M tokens blended. Claude Opus 5 leads in every category we measure both in. Gemini 3 Flash streams 3×+ faster.

Key facts (as of 29 Oct 2026)

  • Claude Opus 5 scores 65.4 on the BenchLeader Index and Gemini 3 Flash scores 59.0 (BenchLeader, 29 Oct 2026).
  • Claude Opus 5 costs $10.00 per 1M tokens blended (list price, 29 Oct 2026).
  • Gemini 3 Flash costs $1.13 per 1M tokens blended (list price, 29 Oct 2026).
  • Gemini 3 Flash streams 3×+ faster than Claude Opus 5 (Artificial Analysis, 7-day median, 29 Oct 2026).
  • Of the 7 benchmarks both models have, Claude Opus 5 leads 7 (BenchLeader, 29 Oct 2026).
Claude Opus 5 benchmarks max Anthropic Gemini 3 Flash benchmarks thinking GoogleOpen in the comparison tool

Which to pick for…

The pick's numbers come first. Category scores on the BenchLeader scale (50 is the average model, 15 points one standard deviation). High confidence means a lead of half a standard deviation or more; under one point is called either.

Use casePickWhyConfidence
Agents & tool useClaude Opus 564 vs 55 category score; τ³-Banking (AA) 42.1% vs 20.8%High
Long documentsEither65 vs 64 category score; AA-LCR v1.1 79.3% vs 78.0%Either
Images and other mediaClaude Opus 568 vs 63 category score; MMMU-Pro 84.7% vs 79.9%Medium
Chat quality (human preference)–Only Claude Opus 5 has an Arena rating (68 category score)Not comparable
Lowest costGemini 3 Flash$1.13 vs $10.00 per 1M blended; agentic coding session $0.042 vs $0.400–
Fastest first answerGemini 3 Flash6.0 s (Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)) vs 43.9 s (Claude Opus 5 (max)) to the first answer token–
High volume on a budgetNeither flagshipA smaller model is usually the better fit: Cheapest good LLMs, Fastest LLMs–

Key differences

  • Claude Opus 5 (max) leads on quality: 65.4 vs 59.0.
  • Claude Opus 5 (max) is stronger in agents & tools, coding, human preference, knowledge, long context, maths, multimodal, reasoning.
  • Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) is stronger in instruction following.
  • Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) is 8.9× cheaper ($1.13 vs $10.00 per 1M blended).
  • Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) streams 3.8× faster (209 vs 56 tokens per second).

At a glance

SpecClaude Opus 5Gemini 3 Flash
DeveloperAnthropicGoogle
Released24 Jul 202617 Dec 2025
Context window (tokens)1,000,0001,048,576
Compared atClaude Opus 5 (max)Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)
Open weightsNoNo
Price in / out / cached input per 1M$5.00 / $25.00 / $0.500$0.500 / $3.00 / $0.050

Category by category

Category scores on the BenchLeader scale: 50 is the average evaluated model, 15 points is one standard deviation. A gap under one point is called level.

CategoryClaude Opus 5 (max)Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)Leader
Reasoning69.2–not comparable
Coding69.9–not comparable
Agents & tools64.255.1Claude Opus 5
Maths70.3–not comparable
Knowledge65.0–not comparable
Instruction following–75.8not comparable
Human preference68.3–not comparable
Multimodal67.662.7Claude Opus 5
Long context64.563.8level

Where sources disagree

Across the 7 benchmarks both have, Claude Opus 5 leads 7, Gemini 3 Flash leads 0. Every overall index that rates both puts Claude Opus 5 ahead.

Overall indexClaude Opus 5 (max)Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)Leader
BenchLeader Index65.459.0Claude Opus 5
Arena Text14911458†Claude Opus 5

Each publisher runs its own tasks, harnesses and effort settings, so their overall verdicts can differ; BenchLeader reconciles them on one scale. † measured at another effort setting of the same model (the publisher did not test the one compared here).

Price, speed and latency

List prices blended at three input tokens per output token. Per-task prices use the token counts on the methodology page; suite cost is what Artificial Analysis paid to run its whole Intelligence Index.

MeasureClaude Opus 5 (max)Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)
Blended price per 1M tokens$10.00$1.13
Input / output per 1M$5.00 / $25.00$0.500 / $3.00
Cached input per 1M$0.500$0.050
Price per task: chat reply$0.0095$0.0011
Price per task: summarize a 30-page report$0.075$0.0078
Price per task: code edit$0.068$0.0075
Price per task: agentic coding session$0.400$0.042
Price per task: structured extraction$0.015$0.0016
Output speed56 tok/s209 tok/s
Time to first answer43.9 s6.0 s
Time to a complete answer52.8 s8.4 s

Each model is compared at its best-ranked reasoning-effort setting. Claude Opus 5 (max) scores 65.4 and takes 44 s to its first answer token; Claude Opus 5 scores 65.2 in 3 s, Claude Opus 5 (high) scores 64.4 in 14 s. Gemini 3 Flash (thinking) scores 59.0 and takes 6 s to its first answer token; Gemini 3 Flash (high) scores 58.3 in 1 s, Gemini 3 Flash scores 57.0 in 1 s. Higher effort means more thinking before the answer: better scores, longer waits and more tokens billed. How reasoning effort changes scores and cost.

Every benchmark

146 benchmarks, grouped by category; each name links to the board and its leaders. † measured at another effort setting of the same model, shown for reference and not counted as a win.

MetricPublisherClaude Opus 5 (max)Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)
BenchLeader IndexBenchLeader65.459.0
Agents & tools scoreBenchLeader64.255.1
Coding scoreBenchLeader69.9–
Human preference scoreBenchLeader68.3–
Knowledge scoreBenchLeader65.0–
Long context scoreBenchLeader64.563.8
Maths scoreBenchLeader70.3–
Multimodal scoreBenchLeader67.662.7
Reasoning scoreBenchLeader69.2–
Instruction following scoreBenchLeader–75.8
Blended price $/MBenchLeader$10.00$1.13
Output speedBenchLeader56 tok/s209 tok/s
Time to first answerBenchLeader43.9 s6.0 s
Context windowBenchLeader1,000,000 tokens1,048,576 tokens
Reasoning
GPQA DiamondEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub93.9%83.2%†
SimpleBenchSimpleBench80.6%†61.1%†
Arena Hard PromptsArena (LMArena)15151493†
LiveBench 1.0 ReasoningLiveBench91.2%–
GPQA Diamond (AA)Artificial Analysis93.2%89.8%
Humanity's Last Exam (AA)Artificial Analysis54.9%36.6%
GPQA Diamond (Vals)Vals AI93.4%†87.9%†
ARC-AGI-1ARC Prize97.5%84.7%†
ARC-AGI-2ARC Prize90.4%33.6%†
ARC-AGI-3ARC Prize30.2%†–
CritPtArtificial Analysis29.1%8.6%
MysteryMechanismVals AI37.4%†–
SciPredictScale AI SEAL–22.2%†
Chess PuzzlesEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub43.0%39.0%†
Mystery Game PuzzlesEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub59.0%20.0%†
LMCAEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub63.3%43.1%†
DTBenchEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub97.6%89.1%†
ForecastBenchForecastBench66.5%64.7%†
BTF-3Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub12.0%†–
Coding
SWE-bench Verified (Epoch)Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub–75.4%†
SciCodeSciCode56.4%–
WeirdMLWeirdML91.8%61.6%†
FrontierCodeCognition53.4%–
GSO-BenchGSO-Bench–9.8%†
Arena CodingArena (LMArena)15281505†
Show all 146 benchmarks
MetricPublisherClaude Opus 5 (max)Gemini 3 Flash (thinking)
Coding
Arena WebDevArena (LMArena)16911440†
LiveBench 1.0 CodingLiveBench81.5%–
LiveCodeBenchVals AI89.0%†85.6%†
IOIVals AI84.3%†–
SWE-bench (Vals)Vals AI97.0%†75.0%†
SWE-Bench ProScale AI SEAL–34.6%†
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)SWE-bench–75.8%†
SWE-bench Verified (any scaffold)SWE-bench–75.8%†
Code MigrationVals AI57.5%†6.4%†
ProgramBenchVals AI3.0%†0.0%†
Vibe Code Bench 1-100Vals AI28.5%†–
Vibe Code Bench v1.1Vals AI88.4%†20.2%†
SWE-Bench Pro (private)Scale AI SEAL–34.6%†
SWE Atlas: Codebase QnAScale AI SEAL63.2%†8.2%†
SWE Atlas: RefactoringScale AI SEAL–10.0%†
SWE Atlas: Test WritingScale AI SEAL62.2%†30.3%†
DeepSWE v1.1Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub73.7%–
CursorBenchCursor46.6%–
ALE-BenchEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub2164.6†1367.2†
FrontierSWEEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub52.0%–
Terminal-Bench 4.0 (AA)Artificial Analysis49.0%–
Terminal-Bench 2.1 (AA)Artificial Analysis89.1%–
Startrise FrontendStartrise82.3%†–
LiveCodeBench (AA)Artificial Analysis–90.8%
Agents & tools
Terminal-BenchTerminal-Bench51.8%64.3%†
OSWorld-Verified 2.0OSWorld31.4%–
APEX-AgentsMercor65.8%–
Arena AgentArena (LMArena)7.6–
LiveBench Agentic CodingLiveBench65.2%–
Terminal-Bench HardArtificial Analysis–38.6%
τ²-Bench Telecom (AA)Artificial Analysis–80.4%
Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals)Vals AI84.6%†53.9%†
MCP AtlasScale AI SEAL85.8%†62.0%†
HiL-BenchScale AI SEAL57.0%†–
τ²-benchτ²-bench–83.5%†
τ³-bench Bankingτ²-bench48.7%27.3%†
τ³-Banking (AA)Artificial Analysis42.1%20.8%
Analyst Agent (AA)Artificial Analysis53.8%–
APEX-Agents (AA)Artificial Analysis–27.7%
CUA-benchVals AI9.0%–
CyberBenchVals AI65.4%†–
Finance Agent v2Vals AI58.6%†42.5%†
Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark v1Vals AI6.7%†0.0%†
Legal Research BenchVals AI55.3%†18.3%†
Poker AgentVals AI–1100.2%†
SkillsBenchVals AI60.4%†–
SREBenchVals AI12.2%†–
Tax Agent BenchVals AI45.5%†11.8%†
Terminal-Bench 2.0 (Vals)Vals AI–51.7%†
Terminal-Bench 4.0 (Vals)Vals AI53.5%†–
Terminal-Bench ScienceVals AI27.1%†–
Time Horizon Index: KSPVals AI18.8%†–
Arena SearchArena (LMArena)1214†–
BALROGBALROG63.4%48.1%†
DeepResearch BenchDeepResearch Bench–47.9%†
PostTrainBenchEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub35.0%†–
GBAEvalEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub79.6%†–
Vending-Bench 2Andon Labs11181.9†3634.7†
AutomationBenchArtificial Analysis56.6%–
GDP.pdf (AA)Artificial Analysis21.6%–
EnterpriseOps-GymArtificial Analysis47.5%–
AA-Briefcase v1.1Artificial Analysis1655–
Terminal-Bench-Science 0.1 (AA)Artificial Analysis28.6%–
DeepSec-Bench (AA)Artificial Analysis25.9%–
BrowseCompOpenAI–16.9%†
FACTS SearchGoogle85.3%†80.9%†
Maths
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub85.6%51.2%†
FrontierMath Tier 4Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub73.2%17.1%†
OTIS Mock AIMEEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub98.9%92.8%†
ProofBenchVals AI99.0%15.0%†
LiveBench MathematicsLiveBench95.7%–
AIME (Vals)Vals AI–95.6%†
MGSMVals AI–93.3%†
AIME 2026MathArena–96.7%†
HMMT February 2026MathArena–89.4%†
MathArena ApexMathArena–15.6%†
Arena MathsArena (LMArena)15151475†
Knowledge
SimpleQA VerifiedEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub59.9%66.8%†
LiveBench 1.0 Data AnalysisLiveBench74.5%–
MMLU-ProVals AI91.6%†88.6%†
LegalBenchVals AI87.0%†86.9%†
CorpFinVals AI73.2%†66.4%†
TaxEvalVals AI75.1%†73.9%†
MedQAVals AI–95.8%†
BioMysteryBenchVals AI79.3%†–
CaseLaw v2Vals AI–55.8%†
Excel Modeling BenchmarkVals AI73.6%†26.0%†
MedCodeVals AI63.6%†55.9%†
MedScribeVals AI91.0%†69.9%†
Public Benefits Bench v1.1Vals AI76.9%†–
DrugDiscoveryBenchScale AI SEAL53.7%–
EBR-benchEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub45.7%–
GDP.pdfEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub24.0%10.0%†
Global-MMLU-Lite (AA)Artificial Analysis–92.8%†
Instruction following
LiveBench LanguageLiveBench88.7%–
LiveBench Instruction FollowingLiveBench63.8%–
IFBenchArtificial Analysis–78.0%
Arena Instruction FollowingArena (LMArena)14951458†
Human preference
Arena TextArena (LMArena)14911473†
EQ-Bench 4EQ-Bench1365†–
Arena Creative WritingArena (LMArena)14741457†
Arena Multi-turnArena (LMArena)14861482†
Arena Longer QueriesArena (LMArena)15021476†
Multimodal
Arena VisionArena (LMArena)1320†1285†
MMMU-ProArtificial Analysis84.7%79.9%
MMMU-Pro (Vals)Vals AI89.9%†87.6%†
MortgageTaxVals AI72.1%†68.7%†
GeoBenchGeoBench–88.0%†
VPCTEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub–72.6%†
Blueprint-Bench 2Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub30.4%†0.0%†
Long context
AA-LCR v1.1Artificial Analysis79.3%78.0%
Arena DocumentArena (LMArena)1490†1439†
MLCRArtificial Analysis11.1%–
Composite
Epoch Capabilities IndexEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub163.8†151.9†
LiveBench 1.0LiveBench80.1%–
AA Intelligence Index v4.3.2Artificial Analysis50.826.3
AA Progress Index v1Artificial Analysis333.7290.1
Vals RSI IndexVals AI33.0%–
Vals Science IndexVals AI47.9%†–
Vals Multimodal IndexVals AI73.9%†52.2%†
Safety & honesty
FORTRESSScale AI SEAL16.8%†–

Data as of 2026-10-29. Best configuration of each model; every score links to its source on the model pages.

What changed

  • Claude Opus 5 (max): 1 score revision.
  • Gemini 3 Flash (thinking): 1 new result (LiveCodeBench (AA)).
  • Claude Opus 5 (max): BenchLeader Index 66.3 → 65.5.
  • Gemini 3 Flash (thinking): BenchLeader Index 60.1 → 59.0.
  • Claude Opus 5 (max): 1 new result (AA Progress Index v1).
  • Gemini 3 Flash (thinking): 1 new result (AA Progress Index v1).
  • Claude Opus 5 (max): BenchLeader Index 66.8 → 66.3.
  • Claude Opus 5 (max): 1 new result (Vals RSI Index).
  • Claude Opus 5 (max): 1 score revision.
  • Claude Opus 5 (max): 1 new result (ForecastBench); 1 score revision.

Rankings: Best LLM overall · Best LLM for coding · Best LLM for agents · Best cheap LLMs

Claude Opus 5 vs Gemini 3 Flash: questions

Is Claude Opus 5 better than Gemini 3 Flash?
Claude Opus 5 (max) leads on quality: 65.4 vs 59.0. The BenchLeader Index combines every independent quality benchmark; Claude Opus 5 (max) is ahead overall as of 29 Oct 2026, but check the category scores for your use.
Claude Opus 5 vs Gemini 3 Flash: which is cheaper, and will that change?
Gemini 3 Flash is cheaper today: $1.13 against $10.00 per million tokens, blended at three input tokens per output token. No price change has been announced for either.
Which is faster, Claude Opus 5 or Gemini 3 Flash?
Gemini 3 Flash streams 3×+ faster (209 vs 56 output tokens per second, Artificial Analysis 7-day median).
Is Claude Opus 5 or Gemini 3 Flash better for agents and tool use?
Claude Opus 5 scores higher in agentic tasks (64 vs 55 on the category index, where 50 is average). On τ³-Banking (AA), the top shared agents & tools benchmark, it is 42.1% for Claude Opus 5 against 20.8% for Gemini 3 Flash.
Which is better for long documents?
They are level on long-context benchmarks (65 vs 64). Both take about 1M tokens: Claude Opus 5 1,000,000, Gemini 3 Flash 1,048,576.
More questions (3)
Which has lower latency?
Gemini 3 Flash answers first: 6.0 s against 43.9 s to the first answer token, as Artificial Analysis measures it. Reasoning effort drives most of this: a higher setting thinks longer before it answers.
Do independent benchmarks agree on Claude Opus 5 vs Gemini 3 Flash?
Across the 7 benchmarks both have, Claude Opus 5 leads 7, Gemini 3 Flash leads 0. Every overall index that rates both puts Claude Opus 5 ahead.
When was Claude Opus 5 released?
Claude Opus 5 was released on 24 Jul 2026.