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Cost and performance comparison

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Claude 3.5 Haiku

Model AAnthropic

Claude Haiku 4.5

Capability score (editorial)82/100
Cost / 1M Tokens
$2.20
70% in · 30% out mix
≈ $2.42 for the same text, tokenizer included
Value Index (score÷cost)
33.9
Higher = better value
Speed
97/100
Context
200K
Tier
Fast Tier

List price from the Anthropic pricing page, verified October 12, 2026.

Its tokenizer produces about 10% more tokens than OpenAI's for the same text, so the real cost runs higher than the list price suggests. This is an estimate: the tokenizer has not been measured yet.

Check the source

How we verify prices

Model BAnthropic

Claude 3.5 Haiku

Capability score (editorial)80/100
Cost / 1M Tokens
$1.76
70% in · 30% out mix
≈ $1.94 for the same text, tokenizer included
Value Index (score÷cost)
41.3
Higher = better value
Speed
97/100
Context
200K
Tier
Fast Tier

Last list price before the model was retired.

Its tokenizer produces about 10% more tokens than OpenAI's for the same text, so the real cost runs higher than the list price suggests. This is an estimate: the tokenizer has not been measured yet.

How we verify prices

In-depth analysis

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Claude 3.5 Haiku: Detailed Comparison

Claude Haiku 4.5 is Anthropic's lightweight-tier language model with a 200K-token context window, excelling at data extraction. Claude 3.5 Haiku from Anthropic is a lightweight-tier model supporting 200K tokens in context, with standout performance in data extraction.

This is a genuine tradeoff rather than a clear win. Claude Haiku 4.5 leads by 3 points on combined coding and reasoning, and costs 20% more for the same text to do it. The margin is narrow enough that the answer depends on your workload: on tasks where the extra capability shows up, the premium pays for itself; on routine work it does not. Claude Haiku 4.5 is priced at $1.00/M input tokens and $5.00/M output tokens. Claude 3.5 Haiku costs $0.80/M input and $4.00/M output.

On iOPTERA's editorial scores, Claude Haiku 4.5 leads with 83/100 for coding and 82/100 for reasoning, against Claude 3.5 Haiku's 82/100 and 80/100.

Capability breakdown

Across the five core benchmark categories, here is how Claude Haiku 4.5 and Claude 3.5 Haiku stack up head to head:

coding
83
82
reasoning
82
80
data extraction
91
90
creative tasks
82
78
vision/multimodal
80
74

Best model by task

  • coding: Claude Haiku 4.5 wins with 83/100
  • reasoning: Claude Haiku 4.5 wins with 82/100
  • data extraction: Claude Haiku 4.5 wins with 91/100
  • creative tasks: Claude Haiku 4.5 wins with 82/100
  • vision/multimodal: Claude Haiku 4.5 wins with 80/100

Estimated monthly cost at scale

For 10M + 2M tokens of text a month (counted the way OpenAI's tokenizer counts), Claude Haiku 4.5 runs about $22.00 while Claude 3.5 Haiku runs about $17.60 — Claude 3.5 Haiku saves roughly $4.40 (20%) every month.

What actually decides it

Both models come from Anthropic, so they share a tokenizer, an API surface, and a billing account. Switching between them is a model-string change and nothing else — no new SDK, no re-tokenizing your prompts to re-estimate cost, no second vendor to onboard. That makes routing between them far cheaper to implement than a cross-vendor split.

These are the same lab's model at the same tier, 11 months apart — so this is an upgrade question, not a choice between alternatives. Claude Haiku 4.5 is the current entry; Claude 3.5 Haiku is here because plenty of production traffic still runs on it. If you are starting something new there is little reason to pick the older one, and if you are already on it the question is whether the migration cost is worth the gain.

Context is effectively a tie: 200K against 200K. Neither model unlocks a document size the other cannot handle, so this axis should not enter the decision. If you were hoping context would break the tie for you, it will not.

Throughput is close enough to ignore — 97/100 versus 97/100. Neither model will feel noticeably quicker in an interactive product, so latency is not a reason to choose between them.

Neither model is the obvious answer. Claude Haiku 4.5 leads on benchmarks, Claude 3.5 Haiku on cost, and the gap is small on both. Run the calculator above with your real token mix — for most workloads that decides it faster than any benchmark table will.

What you actually pay

The list price is only the start. Prompt caching, batch processing and long prompts change the bill, and each provider sets them differently. Prices per 1M tokens.

Pricing terms beyond the list price, per 1M tokens
Pricing termClaude Haiku 4.5Claude 3.5 Haiku
List price (input / output)$1.00 / $5.00$0.80 / $4.00
Cached input$0.1010% of the input price—
Batch API50% off input and output—
Long promptsNo surcharge across the 200K window—
Input with 80% cache hits$0.28—

The last row assumes 80% of input tokens are read from the cache, as in a chat app that re-sends a long system prompt or RAG over the same documents. Cache-write and storage charges are not included.

Claude also bills cache writes: 1.25× the input price for a 5-minute cache, 2× for one hour.

Checked on October 8, 2026 against the pricing pages of Anthropic.

Capability scores

iOPTERA editorial scores across 5 categories — informed by public benchmarks, not measured by us

CategoryClaude HaikuClaude 3.5Winner

Coding

83
82
A

Reasoning

82
80
A

Extraction

91
90
A

Creative

82
78
A

Vision

80
74
A
Claude Haiku 4.5: 5 wins
Claude 3.5 Haiku: 0 wins
Claude Haiku 4.5 leads overall

Speed Score

97/100vs97/100
ClaudeClaude

Context Window

200Kvs200K
ClaudeClaude

What Is a Token?

Models don't read words — they process tokens.

A token is roughly 4 characters of English text (~¾ of a word). Your API bill is priced per million tokens — understanding this directly reduces your costs.

Short phrase

"Hello, world!"

4 tokens
Claude Haiku 4.5
$0.44
Claude 3.5 Haiku
$0.35

Business email

One typical email (~200 words)

~270 tokens
Claude Haiku 4.5
$29.70
Claude 3.5 Haiku
$23.76

Code file

50-line Python script

~400 tokens
Claude Haiku 4.5
$44.00
Claude 3.5 Haiku
$35.20

Prices shown are for 100,000 runs of each workload — one run costs a fraction of a cent on both Claude Haiku 4.5 and Claude 3.5 Haiku, so the number only becomes meaningful at production volume. Input tokens only; add your output volume in the calculator below.

How to check your token usage

response.usage.total_tokens

Every API response includes a usage object. Sum total_tokens across all calls to get your monthly figure, then use the calculator below.

Your Cost Calculator

Enter your actual monthly token usage to see real savings

Quick Presets

30M tokens
Prompt 70%Completion 30%

Claude Haiku 4.5

$72.60/mo

$871.20/yr

$1.00/M input$5.00/M output
Cheaper

Claude 3.5 Haiku

$58.08/mo

$696.96/yr

$0.80/M input$4.00/M output

Annual Savings

$174.24 saved per year

Claude 3.5 Haiku cheaper · $14.52/mo

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