Model comparison
Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
Claude Sonnet 5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.6 to 41.5 on the Noometry Index. Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite costs 4.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 36 shared benchmarks.
GoogleSummary
- They share 36 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 5 scores higher in 10 categories and Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Claude Sonnet 5 leads 66.2 to 25.9.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is ProofBench: 77% for Claude Sonnet 5 and 13% for Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite.
- Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite is cheaper at $0.30 / $2.50 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $10 for Claude Sonnet 5.
- Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 1M.
Side by side
| Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | |
| Noometry Index | 54.6 | 41.5 |
| Released | 2026-06-29 | 2026-07-21 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| Context window | 1M | 1.05M |
| Max output | 128K | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $2 | $0.30 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $10 | $2.50 |
| Results tracked | 51 | 39 |
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Category by category
Coding Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 55.5 (#26), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 42.4 (#104)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena WebDev | 1541 | 1440 |
| SciCode | 54.3% | 41.3% |
| WeirdML | 68.8% | 39% |
| LMArena Coding | 1483 | 1453 |
| ALE-Bench | 1,463 | 765.27 |
| DeepSWE | 53.8% | — |
| FrontierCode | 42.7% | — |
| CursorBench | 34.1% | — |
| GSO | 37.3% | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 42.8 (#18), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 25.7 (#107)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| APEX-Agents | 54.5% | 29.3% |
| GBAEval | 65.3% | — |
| GDP.pdf | — | 10% |
| LMArena Search | 1194 | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 6,378 | — |
Reasoning Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 49.1 (#39), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 27.8 (#114)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| NYT Connections (extended) | 75.1% | 60.4% |
| CritPt | 16.9% | 0% |
| Chess Puzzles | 35% | 22% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1461 | 1441 |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 35% | 19% |
| DTBench | 92.5% | 83.5% |
| LMCA | 50% | 37.6% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 156.21 | 145.13 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | — | 10.3% |
| SimpleBench | 60.6% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | — | 53.5% |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 60% | — |
| Bench to the Future 3 | 0.14 | — |
| ForecastBench | 61.1 | — |
Math Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 66.2 (#27), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 25.9 (#264)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 65.6% | 26% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 29.3% | 0% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 94.7% | 71.1% |
| ProofBench | 77% | 13% |
| LMArena Math | 1467 | 1433 |
Knowledge Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 55.6 (#47), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 50.1 (#72)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 90.5% | 83.3% |
| LMArena Expert | 1490 | 1435 |
| SimpleQA Verified | 33.7% | — |
Multimodal Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 42.4 (#31), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 41.1 (#40)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1274 | 1268 |
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | 24.9% | — |
| LMArena Document | 1466 | — |
Multilingual Too close to call
Claude Sonnet 5: 53.8 (#55), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 53.5 (#63)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1431 | 1427 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1477 | 1469 |
| LMArena French | 1460 | 1451 |
| LMArena German | 1440 | 1454 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1422 | 1427 |
| LMArena Korean | 1411 | 1407 |
| LMArena Russian | 1451 | 1443 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1437 | 1442 |
Instruction Following Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 76.3 (#41), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 74.8 (#85)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1452 | 1420 |
Long Context Too close to call
Claude Sonnet 5: 44.8 (#55), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 43.9 (#84)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1463 | 1435 |
Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 69.2 (#25), Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 64.2 (#57)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1442 | 1435 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1416 | 1420 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1794 | 1559 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1454 | 1445 |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1236 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Claude Sonnet 5 better than Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?
Claude Sonnet 5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.6 to 41.5 on the Noometry Index. Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite costs 4.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite?
Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite is cheaper. It lists at $0.30 per million input tokens and $2.50 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 5 lists at $2 and $10.
Is Claude Sonnet 5 or Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite better for coding?
Claude Sonnet 5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 55.5 versus 42.4 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite does, with 1.05M tokens against 1M.
How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 5 and Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite share?
36 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 5 has 51 scored results on Noometry and Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite has 39.