Pricing comparison
Claude Sonnet 4.6 vs Claude Haiku 4.5
Per-token pricing, full-workload cost ladders, and monthly volume projections. Numbers sourced directly from each provider's rate card.
Anthropic
Claude Sonnet 4.6
- Input
- $3.00 / 1M
- Output
- $15.00 / 1M
- Cached input
- -
- Context
- 1M
- Max output
- 64K
Anthropic
Claude Haiku 4.5
- Input
- $1.00 / 1M
- Output
- $5.00 / 1M
- Cached input
- -
- Context
- 200K
- Max output
- 64K
Cost per request
Four common workload shapes, input tokens and a 1:2 output ratio (a standard chat/completion pattern). Long-context surcharges apply automatically where the provider charges them.
| Scenario | Tokens (in / out) | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Short prompt | 100 / 200 | $0.0033 | $0.0011 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Typical request | 1,000 / 2,000 | $0.0330 | $0.0110 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Long document | 10,000 / 5,000 | $0.1050 | $0.0350 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Large prompt | 100,000 / 10,000 | $0.4500 | $0.1500 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
Monthly bill at scale
Projected monthly cost at typical request volume, assuming the "typical request" shape above (1k in, 2k out).
| Traffic | Req / month | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Delta |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Small SaaS | 1,000 | $33.00 | $11.00 | Claude Haiku 4.5 -$22.00 |
| Growing product | 10,000 | $330.00 | $110.00 | Claude Haiku 4.5 -$220.00 |
| Heavy usage | 100,000 | $3,300 | $1,100 | Claude Haiku 4.5 -$2,200 |
Which should you use?
For the typical chat-shape request (~1k input, 2k output), Claude Haiku 4.5 comes out 200% cheaper. If you're picking one as the default, that's usually the right choice on cost alone.
Claude Haiku 4.5 wins on both sides of the bill - cheaper input and cheaper output. If the quality gap is in your favour, there's no cost argument for the other side.
Context window differs: Claude Sonnet 4.6 holds 1M of input vs 200K on the other side. If you regularly push past the smaller ceiling, the comparison ends there.
Live cost calculator
Type in any token counts - both prices update instantly. Uses base input/output rates (no cache discount, no long-context tier).
Claude Sonnet 4.6
$0.0105
per request
Claude Haiku 4.5
$0.0035
per request
Try both in the estimator →
Drop your actual prompt in, tokens are counted with the provider's own tokenizer, and the dollar number matches what lands on your invoice.
Frequently asked
- Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 4.6 or Claude Haiku 4.5?
- On a typical 1,000-input / 2,000-output request, Claude Haiku 4.5 costs ~$0.0110 vs ~$0.0330 on Claude Sonnet 4.6. Input or output rates can flip the answer for very lopsided workloads - see the cost ladder above.
- What's the difference in per-token pricing?
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 charges $3.00 per 1M input tokens and $15.00 per 1M output tokens. Claude Haiku 4.5 charges $1.00 / $5.00 per 1M.
- Which has the bigger context window?
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 is larger (1M) vs 200K on the other.
- How fresh is this comparison?
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 was re-verified on 2026-04-06 and Claude Haiku 4.5 on 2026-04-06 against each provider's published rate card. Calcis re-checks every row on a rolling schedule and re-deploys when a provider changes pricing.
Claude Sonnet 4.6 verified 2026-04-06 · Claude Haiku 4.5 verified 2026-04-06. Rate cards at Anthropic.