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Model comparison

Claude Sonnet 5 vs MiniMax M3

Data verified

Head-to-head evidence from 25 shared benchmark results across 5 categories. Overall scores shown here use the public BenchAlign v5 ranking lane.

65.32/100
Margin
4.4pts
winning →
MiniMax M3
MiniMax
69.75/100
3 category wins0 category wins

Public leaderboard positions: Claude Sonnet 5 #29 (Estimated); MiniMax M3 #15 (Supported). Intervals and evidence labels describe ranking uncertainty, not a guarantee for a specific workload.

Evidence parity. Claude Sonnet 5 and MiniMax M3 share 25 comparable benchmark results. 3 of 8 categories are comparable. 11 results are unique to Claude Sonnet 5; 20 to MiniMax M3.

Updated July 23, 2026
Shared results
25
Claude Sonnet 5 only
11
MiniMax M3 only
20
Comparable categories
3 / 8

Pick MiniMax M3 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Claude Sonnet 5 only becomes the better choice if multimodal & grounded is the priority or you want the stronger reasoning-first profile.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 25 shared benchmark results across 5 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

MiniMax M3 is clearly ahead on the BenchAlign aggregate, 69.75 to 65.32. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

Claude Sonnet 5 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $2.00 input / $10.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $0.30 input / $1.20 output per 1M tokens for MiniMax M3. That is roughly 8.3x on output cost alone. Claude Sonnet 5 is the reasoning model in the pair, while MiniMax M3 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.

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 Sonnet 5 and MiniMax M3
CategoryClaude Sonnet 5ΔMiniMax M3
MultimodalClaude Sonnet 588.3Margin← 23.4MiniMax M364.9
AgenticClaude Sonnet 581.9Margin← 9.6MiniMax M372.3
CodingClaude Sonnet 576.7Margin← 4.5MiniMax M372.2
KnowledgeClaude Sonnet 557.4MarginNo overlapMiniMax M3Not measured
MathClaude Sonnet 5Not measuredMarginNo overlapMiniMax M385.7

Decisive benchmark drivers

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

More
A · Claude Sonnet 5B · MiniMax M3

  1. Terminal-Bench 2.0

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 80.4%B 66%
    Winner: Claude Sonnet 5Δ 14.4
    Terminal-Bench 2.0: Claude Sonnet 5 scored 80.4%; MiniMax M3 scored 66%. Claude Sonnet 5 wins this benchmark.

  2. OSWorld-Verified

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 81.2%B 70.1%
    Winner: Claude Sonnet 5Δ 11.1
    OSWorld-Verified: Claude Sonnet 5 scored 81.2%; MiniMax M3 scored 70.1%. Claude Sonnet 5 wins this benchmark.

  3. SWE-bench Verified

    Coding
    Source ↗
    A 85.2%B 80.5%
    Winner: Claude Sonnet 5Δ 4.7
    SWE-bench Verified: Claude Sonnet 5 scored 85.2%; MiniMax M3 scored 80.5%. Claude Sonnet 5 wins this benchmark.

  4. SWE-bench Pro

    Coding
    Source ↗
    A 63.2%B 59%
    Winner: Claude Sonnet 5Δ 4.2
    SWE-bench Pro: Claude Sonnet 5 scored 63.2%; MiniMax M3 scored 59%. Claude Sonnet 5 wins this benchmark.

  5. BrowseComp

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 84.7%B 83.5%
    Winner: Claude Sonnet 5Δ 1.2
    BrowseComp: Claude Sonnet 5 scored 84.7%; MiniMax M3 scored 83.5%. Claude Sonnet 5 wins this benchmark.

Operational comparison

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

MetricClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Comparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokensClaude Sonnet 5$2 input / $10 outputMiniMax M3$0.3 input / $1.2 outputMiniMax M3 has the lower combined listed price.
Generation speedtokens per secondClaude Sonnet 5Not availableMiniMax M3Not availableA complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first tokenClaude Sonnet 5Not availableMiniMax M3Not availableA complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokensClaude Sonnet 51MMiniMax M31MListed context windows are equal.

Benchmark Deep Dive

AgenticClaude Sonnet 5 wins
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 80.4%66%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
BrowseCompSource 84.7%83.5%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
HLE w/ toolsSource 57.4%—Not comparable
OSWorld-VerifiedSource 81.2%70.1%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
GDPval-AASource 16071395Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA Agentic IndexSource 46.7%35.4%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
GDPval-AASource 55.4%44.7%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA BriefcaseSource 13881110Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA AutomationBenchSource 39.2%—Not comparable
AA EnterpriseOps-GymSource 44.7%32.1%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA Harvey LABSource 90.1%88.4%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA Tau3 BankingSource 28.2%—Not comparable
aaTerminalBench21Source 80.5%65.2%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
MCP AtlasSource —74.2%Not comparable
Claw-EvalSource —74.5%Not comparable
τ²-bench resultsSource —88.9%Not comparable
GDPval rubricsSource —74.7%Not comparable
BankerToolBenchSource —76.1%Not comparable
ResearchClawBenchSource —19.8%Not comparable
OSWorld 2.0Source —4.6%Not comparable
terminalBenchHardSource —42.4%Not comparable
CodingClaude Sonnet 5 wins
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
SWE-bench VerifiedSource 85.2%80.5%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
SWE-bench ProSource 63.2%59%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
SWE MultilingualSource 78.3%—Not comparable
SWE MultimodalSource 28.1%—Not comparable
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 80.4%66.0%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
FrontierCode 1.1 MainSource 42.7%—Not comparable
cursorBench32Source 61.5%—Not comparable
AA Coding IndexSource 71.5%58.6%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA-SciCodeSource 53.6%45.4%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
NL2RepoSource —42.1%Not comparable
VIBE V2Source —50.1%Not comparable
SVG-BenchSource —63.7%Not comparable
KernelBench HardSource —28.8%Not comparable
Reasoning
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
AA-LCRSource 70.7%74.0%MiniMax M3 leads
CritPtSource 16.9%3.7%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Knowledge
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
HLESource 57.4%—Not comparable
HLE w/o toolsSource 43.2%—Not comparable
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource 53.4%44.4%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource 91.1%92.9%MiniMax M3 leads
AA-HLESource 39.6%37.1%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource 15.3%1.4%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource 38.3%15.0%Claude Sonnet 5 leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource 37.3%16.1%MiniMax M3 leads
AA Openness IndexSource —33.3%Not comparable
Math
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
USAMO 2026Source —85.7%Not comparable
MultimodalClaude Sonnet 5 wins
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
CharXivSource 88.3%—Not comparable
CharXiv w/o toolsSource 77%—Not comparable
AA-MMMU-ProSource 77.3%78.6%MiniMax M3 leads
Design Arena WebsiteSource 13141289Claude Sonnet 5 leads
OfficeQA ProSource —45.1%Not comparable
OmniDocBench 1.5Source —91.6%Not comparable
MMMU-ProSource —78.1%Not comparable
VideoMMMUSource —84.6%Not comparable
Video-MME (with subtitle)Source —85.4%Not comparable
Inst. Following
BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5MiniMax M3Result
AA-IFBenchSource —82.9%Not comparable
Frequently Asked Questions (4)

Which is better, Claude Sonnet 5 or MiniMax M3?

MiniMax M3 is ahead on BenchLM's BenchAlign leaderboard, 69.75 to 65.32. The biggest single separator in this matchup is Terminal-Bench 2.0, where the scores are 80.4% and 66%.

Which is better for coding, Claude Sonnet 5 or MiniMax M3?

Claude Sonnet 5 has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 76.7 versus 72.2. Inside this category, Terminal-Bench 2.0 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, Claude Sonnet 5 or MiniMax M3?

Claude Sonnet 5 has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 81.9 versus 72.3. Inside this category, AA Briefcase is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, Claude Sonnet 5 or MiniMax M3?

Claude Sonnet 5 has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 88.3 versus 64.9. Inside this category, Design Arena Website is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

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