Claude Opus 4.5 Vision vs Gemini 3 Flash Max: which model should you choose?
We compared Claude Opus 4.5 Vision and Gemini 3 Flash Max on price, context window and 12 benchmarks. Claude Opus 4.5 Vision has the stronger average benchmark score; Gemini 3 Flash Max is cheaper on a blended 3:1 basis.
Claude Opus 4.5 Vision
Claude Opus 4.5 Vision is a frontier model from Anthropic. It offers a 200,000-token context window, costs $17.70 per million input tokens and $74.84 per million output tokens, and averages 85.9 across the index's benchmark suite.
- Input
- $17.70 / 1M
- Output
- $74.84 / 1M
- Context
- 200,000
- Avg score
- 85.9
- Open weights
- No
Gemini 3 Flash Max
Gemini 3 Flash Max is a frontier model from Google DeepMind. It offers a 1,000,000-token context window, costs $17.43 per million input tokens and $63.42 per million output tokens, and averages 85.0 across the index's benchmark suite.
- Input
- $17.43 / 1M
- Output
- $63.42 / 1M
- Context
- 1,000,000
- Avg score
- 85.0
- Open weights
- No
Specification comparison
| Spec | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision | Gemini 3 Flash Max | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input price / 1M | $17.70 | $17.43 | B |
| Output price / 1M | $74.84 | $63.42 | B |
| Context window | 200,000 | 1,000,000 | B |
| Max output | 32,768 | 65,536 | B |
| Average score | 85.9 | 85.0 | A |
| Arena Elo | 1452.2 | 1448.5 | A |
| Open weights | No | No | Tie |
Benchmark comparison
Claude Opus 4.5 Vision wins 7, Gemini 3 Flash Max wins 5, and 0 benchmarks are tied. The table shows the modelled score for each model and the gap.
| Benchmark | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision | Gemini 3 Flash Max | Gap | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU-Pro | 86.9 | 87.8 | 0.9 | Gemini 3 Flash Max |
| GPQA Diamond | 80.7 | 80.9 | 0.2 | Gemini 3 Flash Max |
| SWE-bench Verified | 77.7 | 73.8 | 3.9 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
| HumanEval | 88.2 | 88.5 | 0.3 | Gemini 3 Flash Max |
| MATH-500 | 91.9 | 88.6 | 3.3 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
| AIME 2025 | 85.4 | 86.7 | 1.3 | Gemini 3 Flash Max |
| LiveCodeBench | 80.1 | 78.3 | 1.8 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
| IFEval | 92.6 | 91.3 | 1.3 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
| TruthfulQA | 86.9 | 87.1 | 0.2 | Gemini 3 Flash Max |
| HellaSwag | 91.4 | 91.1 | 0.3 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
| MMMU | 83.2 | 81.0 | 2.2 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
| Arena Elo | 1452.2 | 1448.5 | 3.7 | Claude Opus 4.5 Vision |
Price analysis
On a blended 3:1 input-to-output basis, Claude Opus 4.5 Vision costs about $31.98 per million tokens and Gemini 3 Flash Max costs about $28.93. Gemini 3 Flash Max is roughly 10% cheaper than Claude Opus 4.5 Vision. At high volume, that gap compounds quickly, so price should carry real weight unless the quality difference is decisive.
Gemini 3 Flash Max has the larger context window at 1,000,000 tokens, compared with 200,000 for Claude Opus 4.5 Vision. That matters for long documents, large codebases and multi-step agent traces.
Verdict
Across 12 shared benchmarks, Claude Opus 4.5 Vision wins 7, Gemini 3 Flash Max wins 5, and 0 are tied. On the index average, Claude Opus 4.5 Vision leads Gemini 3 Flash Max by 0.9 points (85.9 versus 85.0).
The price picture favours Gemini 3 Flash Max. The context picture favours Gemini 3 Flash Max. Those two dimensions often matter more than a few benchmark points once a model is good enough for the task.
If you need a single default, start with Claude Opus 4.5 Vision for quality-sensitive work and Gemini 3 Flash Max for high-volume, well-scoped tasks. Run both on a sample of your own traffic before locking in a choice.
Choose Claude Opus 4.5 Vision if
- You want the higher average benchmark score in this index.
Choose Gemini 3 Flash Max if
- Unit cost matters and you want the cheaper blended price.
- You need the larger 1,000,000-token context window.
- You need the larger 65,536-token output limit.
FAQ
Is Claude Opus 4.5 Vision better than Gemini 3 Flash Max?
On the index average, Claude Opus 4.5 Vision leads Gemini 3 Flash Max by 0.9 points (85.9 versus 85.0). The better choice depends on price, context and your task. Claude Opus 4.5 Vision wins 7 benchmarks, Gemini 3 Flash Max wins 5.
Which is cheaper, Claude Opus 4.5 Vision or Gemini 3 Flash Max?
Gemini 3 Flash Max is cheaper on a blended 3:1 basis at about $28.93 per million tokens, versus $31.98 for Claude Opus 4.5 Vision.
Which has the larger context window?
Gemini 3 Flash Max has the larger context window at 1,000,000 tokens. Claude Opus 4.5 Vision has 200,000 tokens.
Are these models open weights?
Claude Opus 4.5 Vision is proprietary; Gemini 3 Flash Max is proprietary.
Which should I choose for production?
If you need a single default, start with Claude Opus 4.5 Vision for quality-sensitive work and Gemini 3 Flash Max for high-volume, well-scoped tasks. Run both on a sample of your own traffic before locking in a choice.