Skip to main content
BenchLM

Model comparison

Claude Opus 4.5 vs Claude Opus 4.8

Data verified

Head-to-head evidence from 27 shared benchmark results across 7 categories. Overall scores shown here use BenchLM's provisional ranking lane.

72/100
Margin
13.0pts
winning →
85/100
1 category wins4 category wins

Verified leaderboard positions: Claude Opus 4.5 #19; Claude Opus 4.8 #3

Evidence parity. Claude Opus 4.5 and Claude Opus 4.8 share 27 comparable benchmark results. 5 of 8 categories are comparable. 33 results are unique to Claude Opus 4.5; 26 to Claude Opus 4.8.

Updated July 12, 2026
Shared results
27
Claude Opus 4.5 only
33
Claude Opus 4.8 only
26
Comparable categories
5 / 8

Pick Claude Opus 4.8 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Claude Opus 4.5 only becomes the better choice if mathematics is the priority or you would rather avoid the extra latency and token burn of a reasoning model.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 27 shared benchmark results across 7 evidence categories; 5 of 8 categories currently have scoreable aggregates for both models. Treat the verdict as directional until coverage is more balanced.

Why this result

Claude Opus 4.8 is clearly ahead on the provisional aggregate, 85 to 72. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

Claude Opus 4.8's sharpest advantage is in agentic, where it averages 80.3 against 62.6. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is HLE, 30.8% to 57.9%. Claude Opus 4.5 does hit back in mathematics, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.

Claude Opus 4.8 is the reasoning model in the pair, while Claude Opus 4.5 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 Opus 4.8 gives you the larger context window at 1M, compared with 200K for Claude Opus 4.5.

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 Opus 4.5 and Claude Opus 4.8
CategoryClaude Opus 4.5ΔClaude Opus 4.8
AgenticClaude Opus 4.562.6Margin→ 17.7Claude Opus 4.880.3
CodingClaude Opus 4.566.0Margin→ 10.4Claude Opus 4.876.4
MultimodalClaude Opus 4.569.9Margin→ 7.1Claude Opus 4.877.0
KnowledgeClaude Opus 4.558.5Margin→ 4.2Claude Opus 4.862.7
MathClaude Opus 4.557.5Margin← 3.6Claude Opus 4.853.9
ReasoningClaude Opus 4.564.4MarginNo overlapClaude Opus 4.8Not measured
MultilingualClaude Opus 4.585.7MarginNo overlapClaude Opus 4.8Not measured
Inst. FollowingClaude Opus 4.569.5MarginNo overlapClaude Opus 4.8Not measured

Decisive benchmark drivers

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

More
A · Claude Opus 4.5B · Claude Opus 4.8

  1. HLE

    Knowledge
    Source ↗
    A 30.8%B 57.9%
    Winner: Claude Opus 4.8Δ 27.1
    HLE: Claude Opus 4.5 scored 30.8%; Claude Opus 4.8 scored 57.9%. Claude Opus 4.8 wins this benchmark.

  2. FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4)

    Math
    Source ↗
    A 4.167%B 31.250%
    Winner: Claude Opus 4.8Δ 27.1
    FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4): Claude Opus 4.5 scored 4.167%; Claude Opus 4.8 scored 31.250%. Claude Opus 4.8 wins this benchmark.

  3. FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)

    Math
    Source ↗
    A 20.690%B 47.241%
    Winner: Claude Opus 4.8Δ 26.6
    FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3): Claude Opus 4.5 scored 20.690%; Claude Opus 4.8 scored 47.241%. Claude Opus 4.8 wins this benchmark.

  4. CharXiv

    Multimodal
    Source ↗
    A 68.5%B 89.9%
    Winner: Claude Opus 4.8Δ 21.4
    CharXiv: Claude Opus 4.5 scored 68.5%; Claude Opus 4.8 scored 89.9%. Claude Opus 4.8 wins this benchmark.

  5. OSWorld-Verified

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 66.3%B 83.4%
    Winner: Claude Opus 4.8Δ 17.1
    OSWorld-Verified: Claude Opus 4.5 scored 66.3%; Claude Opus 4.8 scored 83.4%. Claude Opus 4.8 wins this benchmark.

Operational comparison

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

MetricClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Comparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokensClaude Opus 4.5$5 input / $25 outputClaude Opus 4.8$5 input / $25 outputListed prices are equal.
Generation speedtokens per secondClaude Opus 4.546 tok/sClaude Opus 4.8Not availableA complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first tokenClaude Opus 4.51.01 sClaude Opus 4.8Not availableA complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokensClaude Opus 4.5200KClaude Opus 4.81MClaude Opus 4.8 lists the larger context window.

Benchmark Deep Dive

AgenticClaude Opus 4.8 wins
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 59.3%74.6%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
OSWorld-VerifiedSource 66.3%83.4%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
OSWorldSource 66.3%—Not comparable
Claw-EvalSource 59.6%—Not comparable
QwenClawBenchSource 52.3%—Not comparable
TAU3-BenchSource 70.2%—Not comparable
VITA-BenchSource 23.3%—Not comparable
DeepPlanningSource 26.4%—Not comparable
ToolathlonSource 43.5%59.9%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
MCP AtlasSource 42.3%82.2%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
MCP-TasksSource 71.8%—Not comparable
WideResearchSource 76.4%—Not comparable
CyberGymSource 50.6%—Not comparable
Tau2-TelecomSource 86.3%94.4%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Gert LabsSource 64.23%72.97%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
JobBenchSource 32.3%—Not comparable
BrowseCompSource —84.3%Not comparable
DeepSearchQASource —93.1%Not comparable
Finance Agent v2Source —53.9%Not comparable
GDPval-AASource —1600Not comparable
AA Agentic IndexSource —47.2%Not comparable
GDPval-AASource —55.0%Not comparable
ResearchClawBenchSource —21.1%Not comparable
OSWorld 2.0Source —20.6%Not comparable
AA BriefcaseSource —1354Not comparable
AA AutomationBenchSource —48.5%Not comparable
AA EnterpriseOps-GymSource —44.0%Not comparable
AA Harvey LABSource —7.5%Not comparable
AA Tau3 BankingSource —27.6%Not comparable
CodingClaude Opus 4.8 wins
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
SWE-bench VerifiedSource 80.9%88.6%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
LiveCodeBench v6Source 84.8%—Not comparable
SWE-bench ProSource 57.1%69.2%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
SWE MultilingualSource 77.5%84.4%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
NL2RepoSource 43.2%—Not comparable
Terminal-Bench HardSource 40.9%58.3%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-SciCodeSource 47.0%53.5%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
SWE MultimodalSource —38.4%Not comparable
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source —74.6%Not comparable
cursorBench31Source —58.4%Not comparable
cursorBench32Source —62.3%Not comparable
AA Coding IndexSource —74.3%Not comparable
FrontierCodeSource —46.5%Not comparable
AA Terminal-Bench 2.1Source —84.6%Not comparable
Reasoning
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
LongBench v2Source 64.4%—Not comparable
AI-NeedleSource 74%—Not comparable
AA-LCRSource 65.3%67.7%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
CritPtSource 0.3%20.9%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
KnowledgeClaude Opus 4.8 wins
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
GPQASource 87%93.6%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
SuperGPQASource 70.6%—Not comparable
MMLU-ProSource 89.5%—Not comparable
MMLU-ReduxSource 96.6%—Not comparable
C-EvalSource 92.2%—Not comparable
HLESource 30.8%57.9%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource 34.7%55.7%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource 81.0%92.0%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-HLESource 12.9%45.7%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource -3.9%27.4%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource 40.7%46.6%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource 75.4%35.9%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA MMLU-ProSource 88.9%—Not comparable
GPQA-DSource —93.6%Not comparable
HLE w/o toolsSource —49.8%Not comparable
MathClaude Opus 4.5 wins
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
AIME26Source 95.1%—Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2025Source 92.9%—Not comparable
HMMT Nov 2025Source 93.3%—Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2026Source 85.3%—Not comparable
MMAnswerBenchSource 84.0%—Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)Source 20.690%47.241%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4)Source 4.167%31.250%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
USAMO 2026Source —96.7%Not comparable
Multilingual
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
MMLU-ProXSource 85.7%—Not comparable
NOVA-63Source 56.7%—Not comparable
INCLUDESource —87.6%Not comparable
MultimodalClaude Opus 4.8 wins
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
MMMU-ProSource 70.6%—Not comparable
MathVisionSource 74.3%—Not comparable
CharXivSource 68.5%89.9%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
VideoMMMUSource 84.4%—Not comparable
ScreenSpot ProSource 45.7%87.9%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
V*Source 67.0%—Not comparable
AA-MMMU-ProSource 71.2%—Not comparable
Design Arena WebsiteSource 12901281Claude Opus 4.5 leads
OfficeQA ProSource —66.2%Not comparable
CharXiv w/o toolsSource —80.5%Not comparable
Inst. Following
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.5Claude Opus 4.8Result
IFEvalSource 90.9%—Not comparable
IFBenchSource 58%—Not comparable
AA-IFBenchSource 43.0%62.2%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Frequently Asked Questions (6)

Which is better, Claude Opus 4.5 or Claude Opus 4.8?

Claude Opus 4.8 is ahead on BenchLM's provisional leaderboard, 85 to 72. The biggest single separator in this matchup is HLE, where the scores are 30.8% and 57.9%.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, Claude Opus 4.5 or Claude Opus 4.8?

Claude Opus 4.8 has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 62.7 versus 58.5. Inside this category, AA-Omniscience Hallucination Rate is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, Claude Opus 4.5 or Claude Opus 4.8?

Claude Opus 4.8 has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 76.4 versus 66. Inside this category, Terminal-Bench Hard is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, Claude Opus 4.5 or Claude Opus 4.8?

Claude Opus 4.5 has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 57.5 versus 53.9. Inside this category, FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4) is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, Claude Opus 4.5 or Claude Opus 4.8?

Claude Opus 4.8 has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 80.3 versus 62.6. Inside this category, MCP Atlas is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, Claude Opus 4.5 or Claude Opus 4.8?

Claude Opus 4.8 has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 77 versus 69.9. Inside this category, ScreenSpot Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Related Comparisons

Explore More

Anthropic Compare Pricing Methodology Find Your Best LLM Overall Rankings
Last updated: July 12, 2026

The AI models change fast. We track them for you.

A weekly brief for engineers and researchers covering new models, ranking shifts, and pricing changes.

Free. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.