Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 4 Carbon
Full profiles: Claude Sonnet 5 (Anthropic) and Gemini 4 Carbon (Google): every benchmark, price and rank.
Updated · Data from 6 sources
As of 29 Oct 2026, Gemini 4 Carbon is ahead of Claude Sonnet 5 on quality (65.1 vs 59.6 on the BenchLeader Index), but Claude Sonnet 5 is 2.0× cheaper at $4.00 vs $8.00 per 1M tokens blended. Gemini 4 Carbon leads in every category we measure both in. Gemini 4 Carbon streams faster.
Key facts (as of 29 Oct 2026)
- Claude Sonnet 5 scores 59.6 on the BenchLeader Index and Gemini 4 Carbon scores 65.1 (BenchLeader, 29 Oct 2026).
- Claude Sonnet 5 costs $4.00 per 1M tokens blended (list price, 29 Oct 2026).
- Gemini 4 Carbon costs $8.00 per 1M tokens blended (list price, 29 Oct 2026).
- Gemini 4 Carbon streams faster than Claude Sonnet 5 (Artificial Analysis, 7-day median, 29 Oct 2026).
- Of the 8 benchmarks both models have, Gemini 4 Carbon leads 8 (BenchLeader, 29 Oct 2026).
Claude Sonnet 5 benchmarks high Anthropic
Gemini 4 Carbon benchmarks high GoogleOpen in the comparison toolWhich 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 case | Pick | Why | Confidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | Gemini 4 Carbon | 72 vs 61 category score; SciCode 64.2% vs 54.3% | High |
| Reasoning | Gemini 4 Carbon | 79 vs 66 category score; Humanity's Last Exam (AA) 60.4% vs 35.7% | High |
| Long documents | Gemini 4 Carbon | 65 vs 63 category score; AA-LCR v1.1 79.3% vs 76.7% | Medium |
| Chat quality (human preference) | – | Only Claude Sonnet 5 has an Arena rating (65 category score) | Not comparable |
| Lowest cost | Claude Sonnet 5 | $4.00 vs $8.00 per 1M blended; agentic coding session $0.160 vs $0.320 | – |
| Fastest first answer | Claude Sonnet 5 | 4.1 s (Claude Sonnet 5 (high)) vs 103.1 s (Gemini 4 Carbon (high)) to the first answer token | – |
| High volume on a budget | Neither flagship | A smaller model is usually the better fit: Cheapest good LLMs, Fastest LLMs | – |
Key differences
- Gemini 4 Carbon (high) leads on quality: 65.1 vs 59.6.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high) is stronger in agents & tools, human preference, maths, multimodal.
- Gemini 4 Carbon (high) is stronger in coding, long context, reasoning, knowledge.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high) is 2.0× cheaper ($4.00 vs $8.00 per 1M blended).
- Gemini 4 Carbon (high) streams 1.4× faster (100 vs 72 tokens per second).
At a glance
| Spec | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 4 Carbon |
|---|---|---|
| Developer | Anthropic | |
| Released | 30 Jun 2026 | 28 Oct 2026 |
| Context window (tokens) | 1,000,000 | 1,000,000 |
| Compared at | Claude Sonnet 5 (high) | Gemini 4 Carbon (high) |
| Open weights | No | No |
| Price in / out / cached input per 1M | $2.00 / $10.00 / $0.200 | $4.00 / $20.00 / – |
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.
| Category | Claude Sonnet 5 (high) | Gemini 4 Carbon (high) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reasoning | 65.5 | 78.9 | Gemini 4 Carbon |
| Coding | 60.5 | 71.7 | Gemini 4 Carbon |
| Agents & tools | 57.4 | – | not comparable |
| Maths | 65.3 | – | not comparable |
| Knowledge | – | 75.8 | not comparable |
| Human preference | 64.9 | – | not comparable |
| Multimodal | 61.0 | – | not comparable |
| Long context | 63.1 | 64.5 | Gemini 4 Carbon |
Where sources disagree
Across the 8 benchmarks both have, Claude Sonnet 5 leads 0, Gemini 4 Carbon leads 8. Every overall index that rates both puts Gemini 4 Carbon ahead.
| Overall index | Claude Sonnet 5 (high) | Gemini 4 Carbon (high) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| BenchLeader Index | 59.6 | 65.1 | Gemini 4 Carbon |
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.
| Measure | Claude Sonnet 5 (high) | Gemini 4 Carbon (high) |
|---|---|---|
| Blended price per 1M tokens | $4.00 | $8.00 |
| Input / output per 1M | $2.00 / $10.00 | $4.00 / $20.00 |
| Cached input per 1M | $0.200 | – |
| Price per task: chat reply | $0.0038 | $0.0076 |
| Price per task: summarize a 30-page report | $0.030 | $0.060 |
| Price per task: code edit | $0.027 | $0.054 |
| Price per task: agentic coding session | $0.160 | $0.320 |
| Price per task: structured extraction | $0.0060 | $0.012 |
| Cost to run a full benchmark suite | – | $7.76 |
| Output speed | 72 tok/s | 100 tok/s |
| Time to first answer | 4.1 s | 103.1 s |
| Time to a complete answer | 11.0 s | 108.1 s |
Each model is compared at its best-ranked reasoning-effort setting. Claude Sonnet 5 (high) scores 59.6 and takes 4 s to its first answer token; Claude Sonnet 5 scores 55.8 in 2 s, Claude Sonnet 5 (xhigh) scores 55.6 in 16 s. Gemini 4 Carbon (high) scores 65.1 and takes 103 s to its first answer token. 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
109 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.
| Metric | Publisher | Claude Sonnet 5 (high) | Gemini 4 Carbon (high) |
|---|---|---|---|
| BenchLeader Index | BenchLeader | 59.6 | 65.1 |
| Agents & tools score | BenchLeader | 57.4 | – |
| Coding score | BenchLeader | 60.5 | 71.7 |
| Human preference score | BenchLeader | 64.9 | – |
| Long context score | BenchLeader | 63.1 | 64.5 |
| Maths score | BenchLeader | 65.3 | – |
| Multimodal score | BenchLeader | 61.0 | – |
| Reasoning score | BenchLeader | 65.5 | 78.9 |
| Knowledge score | BenchLeader | – | 75.8 |
| Blended price $/M | BenchLeader | $4.00 | $8.00 |
| Output speed | BenchLeader | 72 tok/s | 100 tok/s |
| Time to first answer | BenchLeader | 4.1 s | 103.1 s |
| Context window | BenchLeader | 1,000,000 tokens | 1,000,000 tokens |
| Reasoning | |||
| GPQA Diamond | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 90.5%† | – |
| SimpleBench | SimpleBench | 60.6%† | – |
| Arena Hard Prompts | Arena (LMArena) | 1490 | – |
| LiveBench 1.0 Reasoning | LiveBench | 88.7%† | – |
| GPQA Diamond (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 91.1%† | – |
| Humanity's Last Exam (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 35.7% | 60.4% |
| HLE-Diamond (AA) | Artificial Analysis | – | 69.1% |
| GPQA Diamond (Vals) | Vals AI | 88.9%† | – |
| CritPt | Artificial Analysis | 15.1% | 36.0% |
| CritPt v2 hard subset (AA) | Artificial Analysis | – | 63.0% |
| Chess Puzzles | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 34.0%† | – |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 16.0%† | – |
| LMCA | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 50.0% | – |
| DTBench | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 84.5% | – |
| ForecastBench | ForecastBench | 63.5%† | – |
| BTF-3 | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 14.2%† | – |
| Coding | |||
| SciCode | SciCode | 54.3% | 64.2% |
| WeirdML | WeirdML | 68.8% | – |
| FrontierCode | Cognition | 42.7%† | – |
| GSO-Bench | GSO-Bench | 37.3%† | – |
| Arena Coding | Arena (LMArena) | 1520 | – |
| Arena WebDev | Arena (LMArena) | 1540 | – |
| LiveBench 1.0 Coding | LiveBench | 80.7%† | – |
| LiveCodeBench | Vals AI | 82.4%† | – |
| IOI | Vals AI | 45.0%† | – |
Show all 109 benchmarks
| Metric | Publisher | Claude Sonnet 5 (high) | Gemini 4 Carbon (high) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | |||
| SWE-bench (Vals) | Vals AI | 79.6%† | – |
| Code Migration | Vals AI | 44.4%† | – |
| ProgramBench | Vals AI | 0.0%† | – |
| Vibe Code Bench 1-100 | Vals AI | 13.8%† | – |
| Vibe Code Bench v1.1 | Vals AI | 81.3%† | 89.1% |
| Surface Evolver Bench | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 60.0%† | – |
| DeepSWE v1.1 | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 48.2% | – |
| CursorBench | Cursor | 30.8% | – |
| ALE-Bench | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 1463.1 | – |
| Terminal-Bench 4.0 (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 5.0% | 65.2% |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 80.5%† | – |
| Startrise Frontend | Startrise | 66.6%† | – |
| FrontierCode 1.1 (AA) | Artificial Analysis | – | 48.5% |
| FrontierCode 2.0 (AA) | Artificial Analysis | – | 40.6% |
| Agents & tools | |||
| Terminal-Bench | Terminal-Bench | 12.4%† | – |
| APEX-Agents | Mercor | 54.5%† | – |
| Arena Agent | Arena (LMArena) | 3.8 | – |
| LiveBench Agentic Coding | LiveBench | 59.4%† | – |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals) | Vals AI | 74.5%† | – |
| τ³-Banking (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 37.3%† | – |
| Analyst Agent (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 46.3%† | – |
| CyberBench | Vals AI | 61.9%† | – |
| Finance Agent v2 | Vals AI | 53.9%† | – |
| Finance Agent v2.1 | Vals AI | – | 67.2% |
| Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark v1.1 | Vals AI | – | 17.5% |
| Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark v1 | Vals AI | 5.0%† | – |
| Legal Research Bench | Vals AI | 41.8%† | 55.8% |
| SkillsBench | Vals AI | 46.5%† | – |
| SREBench | Vals AI | 0.4%† | – |
| Tax Agent Bench | Vals AI | 29.4%† | 48.9% |
| Terminal-Bench 4.0 (Vals) | Vals AI | 10.6%† | 63.1% |
| Terminal-Bench Science | Vals AI | 5.7%† | – |
| GBAEval | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 65.3%† | – |
| Vending-Bench 2 | Andon Labs | 6377.7† | 16484.2† |
| AutomationBench | Artificial Analysis | 32.1% | 77.8% |
| GDP.pdf (AA) | Artificial Analysis | 9.4% | 28.4% |
| EnterpriseOps-Gym | Artificial Analysis | 43.9%† | – |
| AA-Briefcase v1.1 | Artificial Analysis | 1356† | 1609 |
| Terminal-Bench-Science 0.1 (AA) | Artificial Analysis | – | 64.8% |
| Maths | |||
| FrontierMath Tiers 1–3 | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 65.6%† | – |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 29.3%† | – |
| OTIS Mock AIME | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 94.7%† | – |
| ProofBench | Vals AI | 77.0%† | – |
| LiveBench Mathematics | LiveBench | 92.9%† | – |
| Arena Maths | Arena (LMArena) | 1473 | – |
| Knowledge | |||
| SimpleQA Verified | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 32.9%† | – |
| LiveBench 1.0 Data Analysis | LiveBench | 71.7%† | – |
| AA-Omniscience v1.1 | Artificial Analysis | – | 53.5 |
| MMLU-Pro | Vals AI | 87.5%† | – |
| LegalBench | Vals AI | 83.9%† | – |
| CorpFin | Vals AI | 67.0%† | – |
| TaxEval | Vals AI | 75.6%† | – |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark | Vals AI | 66.3%† | – |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark v1.1 | Vals AI | – | 76.5% |
| MedCode | Vals AI | 47.5%† | – |
| MedScribe | Vals AI | 76.0%† | – |
| Public Benefits Bench v1.1 | Vals AI | 66.0%† | – |
| DrugDiscoveryBench | Scale AI SEAL | 50.0%† | – |
| AA-Omniscience v1.1: accuracy | Artificial Analysis | – | 58.3% |
| AA-Omniscience v1.1: non-hallucination | Artificial Analysis | – | 88.6% |
| Instruction following | |||
| LiveBench Language | LiveBench | 75.0%† | – |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | LiveBench | 63.9%† | – |
| Arena Instruction Following | Arena (LMArena) | 1466 | – |
| Human preference | |||
| Arena Text | Arena (LMArena) | 1462 | – |
| EQ-Bench 4 | EQ-Bench | 1221† | – |
| Arena Creative Writing | Arena (LMArena) | 1435 | – |
| Arena Multi-turn | Arena (LMArena) | 1473 | – |
| Arena Longer Queries | Arena (LMArena) | 1481 | – |
| Multimodal | |||
| Arena Vision | Arena (LMArena) | 1273 | – |
| MMMU-Pro | Artificial Analysis | 77.3%† | – |
| MMMU-Pro (Vals) | Vals AI | 83.0%† | – |
| MortgageTax | Vals AI | 70.0%† | – |
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 24.9%† | 58.6%† |
| Long context | |||
| AA-LCR v1.1 | Artificial Analysis | 76.7% | 79.3% |
| Arena Document | Arena (LMArena) | 1476 | – |
| MLCR | Artificial Analysis | 4.4% | – |
| Composite | |||
| Epoch Capabilities Index | Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub | 156.9† | – |
| LiveBench 1.0 | LiveBench | 76.0%† | – |
| AA Intelligence Index v5.0 | Artificial Analysis | – | 59.4 |
| AA Intelligence Index v4.3.2 | Artificial Analysis | 31.7 | – |
| AA Progress Index v1 | Artificial Analysis | 296.8 | 351.6 |
| Vals Index | Vals AI | – | 70.4 |
| Vals Finance Index | Vals AI | – | 66.3% |
| Vals Multimodal Index | Vals AI | 68.8%† | – |
Data as of 2026-10-29. Best configuration of each model; every score links to its source on the model pages.
What changed
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 new result (AA Progress Index v1).
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 new result (MLCR).
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 score revision.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 2 new results (AutomationBench, GDP.pdf (AA)).
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 score revision.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 score revision.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 score revision.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 score revision.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): 1 score revision.
- Claude Sonnet 5 (high): BenchLeader Index 60.6 → 60.0.
Related comparisons
- Claude Sonnet 5 vs Claude Opus 5.5
- Claude Sonnet 5 vs GPT-6 Astra
- Claude Sonnet 5 vs GPT-6.1 Sol
- Gemini 4 Carbon vs Claude Opus 5.5
- Gemini 4 Carbon vs GPT-6 Astra
- Gemini 4 Carbon vs GPT-6.1 Sol
- Gemini 4 Carbon vs Claude Fable 5.1
- Claude Fable 5 vs Gemini 4 Carbon
Rankings: Best LLM overall · Best LLM for coding · Best LLM for agents · Best cheap LLMs
Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 4 Carbon: questions
- Is Gemini 4 Carbon better than Claude Sonnet 5?
- Gemini 4 Carbon (high) leads on quality: 65.1 vs 59.6. The BenchLeader Index combines every independent quality benchmark; Gemini 4 Carbon (high) is ahead overall as of 29 Oct 2026, but check the category scores for your use.
- Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 4 Carbon: which is cheaper, and will that change?
- Claude Sonnet 5 is cheaper today: $4.00 against $8.00 per million tokens, blended at three input tokens per output token. No price change has been announced for either.
- Is Claude Sonnet 5 or Gemini 4 Carbon better for coding?
- Gemini 4 Carbon scores higher in coding (72 vs 61 on the category index, where 50 is average). On SciCode, the top shared coding benchmark, it is 54.3% for Claude Sonnet 5 against 64.2% for Gemini 4 Carbon.
- Which is faster, Claude Sonnet 5 or Gemini 4 Carbon?
- Gemini 4 Carbon streams faster (100 vs 72 output tokens per second, Artificial Analysis 7-day median).
- Which is better for long documents?
- Gemini 4 Carbon scores higher on long-context benchmarks (65 vs 63). Both accept 1,000,000 tokens of context.
More questions (3)
- Which has lower latency?
- Claude Sonnet 5 answers first: 4.1 s against 103.1 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 Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 4 Carbon?
- Across the 8 benchmarks both have, Claude Sonnet 5 leads 0, Gemini 4 Carbon leads 8. Every overall index that rates both puts Gemini 4 Carbon ahead.
- When was Gemini 4 Carbon released?
- Gemini 4 Carbon was released on 28 Oct 2026.