Which model is better: Claude 3.5 Sonnet or o3-mini?

o3-mini is 63.3% cheaper for input tokens ($1.10 vs. $3.00 per 1M tokens) and $4.40 vs. $15.00 for output tokens (2.7x cost difference). In terms of operational performance, Claude 3.5 Sonnet delivers faster response latency with 320ms TTFT (880ms faster than o3-mini). Claude 3.5 Sonnet leads coding benchmarks at 63.7% SWE-bench vs. 49.3% for o3-mini.
Verified daily via automated API latency tests and official documentation.

Verified Performance & Unit Economics Delta

Daily synchronized metrics from synthetic latency endpoints and benchmark evaluations.

Metric / Dimension Claude 3.5 Sonnet o3-mini Net Delta / Advantage
Input Cost / 1M Tokens $3.00 $1.10 o3-mini is 2.7x cheaper
Output Cost / 1M Tokens $15.00 $4.40 o3-mini (240.9% lower)
Avg TTFT Response Latency 320ms 1200ms Claude 3.5 Sonnet (+880ms faster)
SWE-bench Verified (Coding) 63.7% 49.3% Claude 3.5 Sonnet (+14.4% lead)
Inference Value Score (IVR) 46 / 100 77 / 100 o3-mini (+31 pts)

Interactive Monthly Token Economics & ROI Forecaster

Model your expected production workload across prompt (input) and completion (output) tokens.

Live Calculation Engine
10.0M Tokens
100K 50M 250M 500M+
2.5M Tokens
100K 10M 50M 100M+

Estimated Monthly Spend

Claude 3.5 Sonnet $5.45

$3/1M in · $15/1M out

o3-mini $67.50

$1.1/1M in · $4.4/1M out

Projected Monthly Cost Reduction
$62.05 / mo
(91.9% lower cost)
A

When to Choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet when you need Full-stack code generation, production AI agents, complex visual diagram parsing, and enterprise document workflows. and have an infrastructure budget aligned with $3.00/1M tokens.

B

When to Choose o3-mini

Choose o3-mini when you need Cost-efficient STEM reasoning, high-throughput math problem-solving, and structured code synthesis. and prioritize OpenAI ecosystem integration at $1.10/1M tokens.

Related Questions & Decision Factors

Which is cheaper: Claude 3.5 Sonnet or o3-mini?

o3-mini is cheaper at $1.10/1M input tokens compared to $3.00/1M for Claude 3.5 Sonnet.

Which model has lower latency: Claude 3.5 Sonnet or o3-mini?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet delivers faster response times with an average TTFT of 320ms vs 1200ms for o3-mini.

When should you choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet?

Choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet when you need Full-stack code generation, production AI agents, complex visual diagram parsing, and enterprise document workflows. and have an infrastructure budget aligned with $3.00/1M tokens.

When should you choose o3-mini?

Choose o3-mini when you need Cost-efficient STEM reasoning, high-throughput math problem-solving, and structured code synthesis. and prioritize OpenAI ecosystem integration at $1.10/1M tokens.

Explore Related Model Matchups