Claude Sonnet 5 vs Claude Sonnet 4.6
Claude Sonnet 5 costs less on both: $1.20 in and $3.00 out per million tokens, against $1.80 in and $9.00 out for Claude Sonnet 4.6. Both on one key at UplinkSwitch, each next to its developer's list price.
Prices · per million tokens, USD
| Tokens | Claude Sonnet 5claude-sonnet-5 | Claude Sonnet 4.6claude-sonnet-4-6 |
|---|---|---|
| Input | $1.20Anthropic lists $2.00 · 40% under | $1.80Anthropic lists $3.00 · 40% under |
| Cached input | $0.12Anthropic lists $0.20 · 40% under | $0.09Anthropic lists $0.30 · 70% under |
| Output | $3.00Anthropic lists $10.00 · 70% under | $9.00Anthropic lists $15.00 · 40% under |
| Context window | 1,000,000 tokens | 1,000,000 tokens |
| Max output | 128,000 tokens | 128,000 tokens |
| Input | text, image | text, image |
| Released | 2026-06-30 | 2026-02-17 |
| Anthropic lifecycle | active, retires no sooner than 2027-06-30 | active, retires no sooner than 2027-02-17 |
| Formats | Anthropic SDK, OpenAI SDK | Anthropic SDK, OpenAI SDK |
| Developer | Anthropic | Anthropic |
List price: each developer's published rate, read October 2026. A model with no cached rate bills cached tokens at its input rate. Live from GET https://api.uplinkswitch.com/v1/catalog. Lifecycle from Anthropic's model deprecations, read 2026-10-19.
What the same work costs · USD, here and at list
| Work | Claude Sonnet 5 | Claude Sonnet 4.6 |
|---|---|---|
| 1,000 chat requests | $3.90list $9.00 | $8.10list $13.50 |
| 100 long documents | $6.60list $12.00 | $10.80list $18.00 |
| A month of both, daily | $315.00list $630.00 | $567.00list $945.00 |
A chat request is 2,000 input and 500 output tokens; a long document is 50,000 in and 2,000 out; the month is 1,000 chats and 100 documents a day for 30 days, uncached. Over that month Claude Sonnet 5 costs $252.00 less here.
Newest in the line
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 is the newest in Claude Sonnet 4.6's line: $1.20 in and $3.00 out per million tokens here, against $2.00 and $10.00 at list. Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Claude Sonnet 4.6.
Same key, same URL
One base URL and one key serve both models. The request below calls Claude Sonnet 5; put claude-sonnet-4-6 in the model field to call Claude Sonnet 4.6 instead.
shell
curl https://api.uplinkswitch.com/v1/chat/completions \
-H "authorization: Bearer sk-uplink-live-..." \
-H "content-type: application/json" \
-d '{"model":"claude-sonnet-5","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"Hello"}]}'Model pages: Claude Sonnet 5, Claude Sonnet 4.6. Pricing by family: Claude. More comparisons: Claude Sonnet 5 vs Claude Opus 4.8, Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview, Claude Sonnet 5 vs Claude Fable 5, Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Claude Sonnet 4.6.
Questions
- Which costs less, Claude Sonnet 5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6?
- Claude Sonnet 5 costs less on both: $1.20 in and $3.00 out per million tokens, against $1.80 in and $9.00 out for Claude Sonnet 4.6.
- Can I switch between them by changing the model id?
- Yes. Both answer in the Anthropic SDK and OpenAI SDK format at the same base URL with the same key. Change the model id from claude-sonnet-5 to claude-sonnet-4-6 and nothing else.
- Is there a subscription?
- No. Prepaid credit from $10, with no subscription or monthly fee. Each top-up locks your prices for 30 days.
- Is Claude Sonnet 5 better than Claude Sonnet 4.6?
- Better depends on the job; this page compares what the catalog can measure. Claude Sonnet 5 costs less on both: $1.20 in and $3.00 out per million tokens, against $1.80 in and $9.00 out for Claude Sonnet 4.6. Both take 1,000,000 tokens of context. Claude Sonnet 5 is the newer release. Both run on the same key, so the fair test is your own prompt sent to each model id.
- Did Claude Sonnet 5’s price go up?
- No. Anthropic made Sonnet 5's launch price, $2.00 input and $10.00 output per million tokens, its standard price; the rise to $3 and $15 planned for 2026-09-01 will not happen (Anthropic pricing, read 2026-10-19). Here Sonnet 5 is $1.20 and $3.00.
- Is Claude Sonnet 4.6 deprecated?
- No. Anthropic lists Sonnet 4.6 as active, retiring no sooner than February 17, 2027. The deprecated Sonnet is 4.5, which retires on November 30, 2026 (Anthropic model deprecations, read 2026-10-19).
- Why is Sonnet 4.6 more expensive than Sonnet 5?
- Sonnet 4.6 kept the 4.x Sonnet list price, $3.00 input and $15.00 output per million tokens, while Sonnet 5 launched at $2.00 and $10.00. Here they are $1.80 / $9.00 and $1.20 / $3.00.