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Model comparison

Claude Fable 5 vs Claude Sonnet 4.6

Data verified

Head-to-head evidence from 17 shared benchmark results across 6 categories. Overall scores shown here use the public BenchAlign v5 ranking lane.

83.68/100
Margin
18.6pts
← winning
65.07/100
2 category wins1 category wins

Public leaderboard positions: Claude Fable 5 #2 (Supported); Claude Sonnet 4.6 #32 (Supported). Intervals and evidence labels describe ranking uncertainty, not a guarantee for a specific workload.

Evidence parity. Claude Fable 5 and Claude Sonnet 4.6 share 17 comparable benchmark results. 3 of 8 categories are comparable. 17 results are unique to Claude Fable 5; 16 to Claude Sonnet 4.6.

Updated July 23, 2026
Shared results
17
Claude Fable 5 only
17
Claude Sonnet 4.6 only
16
Comparable categories
3 / 8

Pick Claude Fable 5 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Claude Sonnet 4.6 only becomes the better choice if multimodal & grounded is the priority or you want the cheaper token bill.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 17 shared benchmark results across 6 evidence categories; 3 of 8 categories currently have scoreable aggregates for both models. Treat the verdict as directional until coverage is more balanced.

Why this result

Claude Fable 5 is clearly ahead on the BenchAlign aggregate, 83.68 to 65.07. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

Claude Fable 5's sharpest advantage is in coding, where it averages 89.2 against 69.1. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is Terminal-Bench 2.0, 84.3% to 59.1%. Claude Sonnet 4.6 does hit back in multimodal & grounded, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.

Claude Fable 5 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $10.00 input / $50.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $3.00 input / $15.00 output per 1M tokens for Claude Sonnet 4.6. That is roughly 3.3x on output cost alone. Claude Fable 5 is the reasoning model in the pair, while Claude Sonnet 4.6 is not. That usually helps on harder chain-of-thought-heavy tests, but it can also mean more latency and more token spend in real use. Claude Fable 5 gives you the larger context window at 1M+, compared with 200K for Claude Sonnet 4.6.

Category breakdown

Exact category averages are shown below. Not measured means BenchLM does not have enough sourced public coverage for that model and category.

Category scores and score margins for Claude Fable 5 and Claude Sonnet 4.6
CategoryClaude Fable 5ΔClaude Sonnet 4.6
CodingClaude Fable 589.2Margin← 20.1Claude Sonnet 4.669.1
MultimodalClaude Fable 557.9Margin→ 19.5Claude Sonnet 4.677.4
AgenticClaude Fable 584.6Margin← 19.4Claude Sonnet 4.665.2
KnowledgeClaude Fable 5Not measuredMarginNo overlapClaude Sonnet 4.666.0
MathClaude Fable 5Not measuredMarginNo overlapClaude Sonnet 4.626.4

Decisive benchmark drivers

The largest measured benchmark gaps in this matchup, with exact reported values.

More
A · Claude Fable 5B · Claude Sonnet 4.6

  1. Terminal-Bench 2.0

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 84.3%B 59.1%
    Winner: Claude Fable 5Δ 25.2
    Terminal-Bench 2.0: Claude Fable 5 scored 84.3%; Claude Sonnet 4.6 scored 59.1%. Claude Fable 5 wins this benchmark.

  2. SWE-bench Verified

    Coding
    Source ↗
    A 95%B 79.6%
    Winner: Claude Fable 5Δ 15.4
    SWE-bench Verified: Claude Fable 5 scored 95%; Claude Sonnet 4.6 scored 79.6%. Claude Fable 5 wins this benchmark.

  3. OSWorld-Verified

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 85%B 72.1%
    Winner: Claude Fable 5Δ 12.9
    OSWorld-Verified: Claude Fable 5 scored 85%; Claude Sonnet 4.6 scored 72.1%. Claude Fable 5 wins this benchmark.

Operational comparison

Runtime and commercial metrics are compared only when both models have a complete sourced value.

MetricClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Comparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokensClaude Fable 5$10 input / $50 outputClaude Sonnet 4.6$3 input / $15 outputClaude Sonnet 4.6 has the lower combined listed price.
Generation speedtokens per secondClaude Fable 5Not availableClaude Sonnet 4.644 tok/sA complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first tokenClaude Fable 5Not availableClaude Sonnet 4.61.48 sA complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokensClaude Fable 51M+Claude Sonnet 4.6200KClaude Fable 5 lists the larger context window.

Benchmark Deep Dive

AgenticClaude Fable 5 wins
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 84.3%59.1%Claude Fable 5 leads
OSWorld-VerifiedSource 85%72.1%Claude Fable 5 leads
GDPval-AASource 1748—Not comparable
AA Agentic IndexSource 52.8%—Not comparable
τ²-bench resultsSource 98.5%79.5%Claude Fable 5 leads
GDPval-AASource 62.4%—Not comparable
AA BriefcaseSource 1574—Not comparable
AA AutomationBenchSource 48.6%—Not comparable
AA EnterpriseOps-GymSource 51.1%—Not comparable
AA Harvey LABSource 93.6%—Not comparable
AA Tau3 BankingSource 26.8%—Not comparable
terminalBenchHardSource 62.9%—Not comparable
aaTerminalBench21Source 84.6%—Not comparable
Claw-EvalSource —67.8%Not comparable
CyberGymSource —65.2%Not comparable
Gert LabsSource —62.92%Not comparable
OSWorld 2.0Source —8.3%Not comparable
JobBenchSource —36.9%Not comparable
CodingClaude Fable 5 wins
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
SWE-bench VerifiedSource 95%79.6%Claude Fable 5 leads
SWE-bench ProSource 80%—Not comparable
FrontierCode 1.1 MainSource 53.5%24.3%Claude Fable 5 leads
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 84.3%—Not comparable
cursorBench31Source 70.6%48.8%Claude Fable 5 leads
cursorBench32Source 70.5%—Not comparable
VulcanBench v3Source 87.0%—Not comparable
AA Coding IndexSource 76.5%—Not comparable
AA-SciCodeSource 60.2%46.9%Claude Fable 5 leads
SWE-RebenchSource —60.7%Not comparable
React Native EvalsSource —80.6%Not comparable
Vibe Code BenchSource —51.48%Not comparable
Reasoning
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
AA-LCRSource 70.0%57.7%Claude Fable 5 leads
CritPtSource 28.6%0.9%Claude Fable 5 leads
Knowledge
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource 59.9%35.9%Claude Fable 5 leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource 92.6%79.9%Claude Fable 5 leads
AA-HLESource 53.3%13.2%Claude Fable 5 leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource 40.2%-2.9%Claude Fable 5 leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource 61.4%38.0%Claude Fable 5 leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource 54.9%65.9%Claude Fable 5 leads
GPQASource —89.9%Not comparable
SuperGPQASource —95%Not comparable
MMLU-ProSource —79.2%Not comparable
HLESource —49%Not comparable
Math
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)Source —32.400%Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4)Source —8.300%Not comparable
MultimodalClaude Sonnet 4.6 wins
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
Blueprint-Bench 2Source 38.6%—Not comparable
OfficeQA ProSource 57.9%—Not comparable
Design Arena WebsiteSource 13321314Claude Fable 5 leads
CharXivSource —77.4%Not comparable
AA-MMMU-ProSource —70.6%Not comparable
Inst. Following
BenchmarkClaude Fable 5Claude Sonnet 4.6Result
AA-IFBenchSource 63.5%41.2%Claude Fable 5 leads
Frequently Asked Questions (4)

Which is better, Claude Fable 5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6?

Claude Fable 5 is ahead on BenchLM's BenchAlign leaderboard, 83.68 to 65.07. The biggest single separator in this matchup is Terminal-Bench 2.0, where the scores are 84.3% and 59.1%.

Which is better for coding, Claude Fable 5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6?

Claude Fable 5 has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 89.2 versus 69.1. Inside this category, FrontierCode 1.1 Main is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, Claude Fable 5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6?

Claude Fable 5 has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 84.6 versus 65.2. Inside this category, Terminal-Bench 2.0 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, Claude Fable 5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6?

Claude Sonnet 4.6 has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 77.4 versus 57.9. Inside this category, Design Arena Website is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

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