Model comparison

Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Granite 4.2 8B

Claude Sonnet 5.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.9 to 40.5 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.2 8B costs 37× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5.5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 11 shared benchmarks.

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Anthropic

61.9

Rank #10 Confirmed

Granite 4.2 8B IBM

40.5

Rank #148 Confirmed

Summary

They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher in 7 categories and Granite 4.2 8B in 0 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in knowledge, where Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads 66.0 to 38.4.
Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.25 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $10 for Claude Sonnet 5.5.
Claude Sonnet 5.5 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 131K.
Granite 4.2 8B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Claude Sonnet 5.5 and Granite 4.2 8B specifications
	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
Provider	Anthropic	IBM
Noometry Index	61.9	40.5
Released	2026-09-28	—
Weights	Proprietary	Open
Context window	1M	131K
Max output	128K	118K
Input $ / M tokens	$2	$0.06
Output $ / M tokens	$10	$0.25
Results tracked	32	11

Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry

Category by category

Coding Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 67.3 (#6), Granite 4.2 8B: 40.5 (#137)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Coding	1513	1380
FrontierCode	52.1%	—
CursorBench	55.5%	—
LMArena WebDev	1774	—
FrontierSWE	61.9%	—
SciCode	61%	—
ALE-Bench	1,819	—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 45.0 (#16), Granite 4.2 8B: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
APEX-Agents	75.5%	—

Reasoning Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 54.0 (#28), Granite 4.2 8B: 26.6 (#131)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Hard Prompts	1495	1329
NYT Connections (extended)	80.5%	—
CritPt	31.4%	—
Mystery Game Puzzles	65%	—
Epoch Capabilities Index	165.03	—

Math Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 87.9 (#6), Granite 4.2 8B: —

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)	88.8%	—
FrontierMath Tier 4	80.5%	—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	100%	—
ProofBench	100%	—
LMArena Math	1510	—
FrontierMath Erdős	2.9%	—

Knowledge Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 66.0 (#12), Granite 4.2 8B: 38.4 (#145)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Expert	1540	1384
GPQA Diamond	95.6%	—
SimpleQA Verified	46.5%	—

Multimodal Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 51.5 (#6), Granite 4.2 8B: —

Multimodal benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Vision	1289	—
Furniture Assembly	75%	—

Multilingual Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 55.3 (#30), Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#178)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Non-English	1452	1302
LMArena Chinese	1522	1366
LMArena Russian	1451	1285

Instruction Following Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 78.3 (#11), Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#184)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Instruction Following	1495	1301

Long Context Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 45.9 (#28), Granite 4.2 8B: 40.3 (#159)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Longer Query	1498	1324

Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 66.0 (#40), Granite 4.2 8B: 49.6 (#189)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Claude Sonnet 5.5	Granite 4.2 8B
LMArena Text	1471	1320
LMArena Creative Writing	1465	1236
LMArena Multi-Turn	1474	1301

Frequently asked questions

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 better than Granite 4.2 8B?

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Granite 4.2 8B?

Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.25 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 5.5 lists at $2 and $10.

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Granite 4.2 8B better for coding?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 67.3 versus 40.5 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 does, with 1M tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 5.5 and Granite 4.2 8B share?

11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 5.5 has 32 scored results on Noometry and Granite 4.2 8B has 11.