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Model comparison

Claude Opus 4.8 vs Gemini 3.6 Flash

Data verified

Head-to-head evidence from 17 shared benchmark results across 4 categories. Overall scores shown here use the public BenchAlign v5 ranking lane.

78.34/100
No comparison
N/A
0 category wins1 category wins

Public leaderboard positions: Claude Opus 4.8 #5 (Supported); Gemini 3.6 Flash unranked (Not scored). Intervals and evidence labels describe ranking uncertainty, not a guarantee for a specific workload.

Evidence parity. Claude Opus 4.8 and Gemini 3.6 Flash share 17 comparable benchmark results. 1 of 8 categories are comparable. 36 results are unique to Claude Opus 4.8; 2 to Gemini 3.6 Flash.

Updated July 21, 2026
Shared results
17
Claude Opus 4.8 only
36
Gemini 3.6 Flash only
2
Comparable categories
1 / 8

Treat this as a split decision. Claude Opus 4.8 makes more sense if its workflow fits your team better; Gemini 3.6 Flash is the better fit if agentic is the priority or you want the cheaper token bill.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 17 shared benchmark results across 4 evidence categories; 1 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 and Gemini 3.6 Flash finish on the same BenchAlign overall score, so this is less about a single winner and more about where the edge shows up. The BenchAlign headline says tie; the benchmark table is where the real choice happens.

Claude Opus 4.8 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $5.00 input / $25.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $1.50 input / $7.50 output per 1M tokens for Gemini 3.6 Flash. That is roughly 3.3x on output cost alone.

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 4.8 and Gemini 3.6 Flash
CategoryClaude Opus 4.8ΔGemini 3.6 Flash
AgenticClaude Opus 4.880.3Margin→ 2.7Gemini 3.6 Flash83.0
CodingClaude Opus 4.881.1MarginNo overlapGemini 3.6 FlashNot measured
KnowledgeClaude Opus 4.862.7MarginNo overlapGemini 3.6 FlashNot measured
MathClaude Opus 4.853.9MarginNo overlapGemini 3.6 FlashNot measured
MultimodalClaude Opus 4.877.0MarginNo overlapGemini 3.6 FlashNot measured

Decisive benchmark drivers

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

More
A · Claude Opus 4.8B · Gemini 3.6 Flash

  1. OSWorld-Verified

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 83.4%B 83%
    Winner: Claude Opus 4.8Δ 0.4
    OSWorld-Verified: Claude Opus 4.8 scored 83.4%; Gemini 3.6 Flash scored 83%. 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 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashComparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokensClaude Opus 4.8$5 input / $25 outputGemini 3.6 Flash$1.5 input / $7.5 outputGemini 3.6 Flash has the lower combined listed price.
Generation speedtokens per secondClaude Opus 4.8Not availableGemini 3.6 FlashNot availableA complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first tokenClaude Opus 4.8Not availableGemini 3.6 FlashNot availableA complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokensClaude Opus 4.81MGemini 3.6 Flash1MListed context windows are equal.

Benchmark Deep Dive

AgenticGemini 3.6 Flash wins
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 74.6%—Not comparable
BrowseCompSource 84.3%—Not comparable
DeepSearchQASource 93.1%—Not comparable
OSWorld-VerifiedSource 83.4%83%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Finance Agent v2Source 53.9%—Not comparable
GDPval-AASource 15941421Claude Opus 4.8 leads
MCP AtlasSource 82.2%—Not comparable
ToolathlonSource 59.9%—Not comparable
Gert LabsSource 72.97%—Not comparable
AA Agentic IndexSource 47.2%38.7%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
τ²-bench resultsSource 94.4%—Not comparable
GDPval-AASource 54.7%46.1%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
ResearchClawBenchSource 21.1%—Not comparable
OSWorld 2.0Source 20.6%—Not comparable
AA BriefcaseSource 1347961Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA AutomationBenchSource 48.5%—Not comparable
AA EnterpriseOps-GymSource 44.0%—Not comparable
AA Harvey LABSource 91.1%—Not comparable
AA Tau3 BankingSource 27.6%24.5%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
terminalBenchHardSource 58.3%—Not comparable
aaTerminalBench21Source 84.6%77.5%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Coding
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
SWE-bench VerifiedSource 88.6%—Not comparable
SWE-bench ProSource 69.2%—Not comparable
SWE MultilingualSource 84.4%—Not comparable
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%69.2%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-SciCodeSource 53.5%52.7%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
FrontierCode 1.1 MainSource 46.5%—Not comparable
deepSweSource —49%Not comparable
Reasoning
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
AA-LCRSource 67.7%69.7%Gemini 3.6 Flash leads
CritPtSource 20.9%10.6%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Knowledge
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
GPQASource 93.6%—Not comparable
GPQA-DSource 93.6%—Not comparable
HLESource 57.9%—Not comparable
HLE w/o toolsSource 49.8%—Not comparable
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource 55.7%50.1%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource 92.0%92.8%Gemini 3.6 Flash leads
AA-HLESource 45.7%38.3%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource 27.4%23.5%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource 46.6%50.2%Gemini 3.6 Flash leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource 35.9%53.5%Claude Opus 4.8 leads
Math
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
USAMO 2026Source 96.7%—Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)Source 47.241%—Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4)Source 31.250%—Not comparable
Multilingual
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
INCLUDESource 87.6%—Not comparable
Multimodal
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
OfficeQA ProSource 66.2%—Not comparable
ScreenSpot ProSource 87.9%—Not comparable
CharXivSource 89.9%—Not comparable
CharXiv w/o toolsSource 80.5%—Not comparable
Design Arena WebsiteSource 1270—Not comparable
AA-MMMU-ProSource —83.2%Not comparable
Inst. Following
BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Gemini 3.6 FlashResult
AA-IFBenchSource 62.2%—Not comparable
Frequently Asked Questions (2)

Which is better, Claude Opus 4.8 or Gemini 3.6 Flash?

Claude Opus 4.8 and Gemini 3.6 Flash are tied on the BenchAlign overall score, so the right pick depends on which category matters most for your use case.

Which is better for agentic tasks, Claude Opus 4.8 or Gemini 3.6 Flash?

Gemini 3.6 Flash has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 83 versus 80.3. Inside this category, AA Briefcase is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

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