Anthropic has released Claude Sonnet 5.5, a new model that runs over 30% faster and costs up to 30% less for most workloads compared to its predecessor. It is priced the same as Sonnet 5 but reportedly outperforms it on every benchmark.
- The model now serves as the engine for the free tier on claude.ai, replacing previous offerings.
- Performance on coding tasks and viral 3D animation tricks is nearly comparable to Opus 5.5.
- The "max" thinking effort mode suffers from a bug causing it to overthink and fail, as seen in a test generating an SVG of a pelican riding a bicycle.
- Haiku 5.5 is scheduled for release in the coming weeks.
Anthropic currently offers a more capable free tier than OpenAI's ChatGPT by using Sonnet 5.5 instead of Luna 5.6.