Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs GLM 4.5 Air
Claude Sonnet 4.5 leads GLM 4.5 Air on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, 20.7 to 11.1, and GLM 4.5 Air costs 13.6x less per output token ($1.10 vs $15.00 per million). Updated October 22, 2026; 38 benchmarks have a result for both.
Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GLM 4.5 Air: which to pick
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a coding score, 39.5 on the Vibe Coding Index; GLM 4.5 Air has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick GLM 4.5 Air for output tokens 13.6x cheaper ($1.10 vs $15.00 per million) and work measured by Design Arena: data viz, where it leads.
- Shared results
- 38
- Claude Sonnet 4.5 only
- 57
- GLM 4.5 Air only
- 10
- Like-for-like categories
- 7 of 9
Only benchmarks that tested both models count toward a pick; a result only one model has is shown but not compared.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, six public coding benchmarks
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a coding score, so no call is made.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
Claude Sonnet 4.5
Claude Sonnet 4.5 leads, 20.7 against 11.1.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a AA Agentic Index result, 15.8.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a GPQA Diamond result, 81.6%.
Directional only
Math
AIME
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a AIME result, 88.2%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a MMLU Pro result, 87.4%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
Claude Sonnet 4.5
Claude Sonnet 4.5 leads, 1189 against 1146.
Same board, both measured
Long documents
Listed context window
Claude Sonnet 4.5
Claude Sonnet 4.5 takes 1M tokens against 131K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
GLM 4.5 Air
Claude Sonnet 4.5 $0.011, GLM 4.5 Air $0.0008 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has the number, $1.16.
Directional only
At a glance
- Coding index
- Claude Sonnet 4.5 39.5 from 3 benchmarks, GLM 4.5 Air not benchmarked.
- Widest category
- Reasoning, 15.3 points apart on average over 4 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- LMArena Text: expert: Claude Sonnet 4.5 1483 against GLM 4.5 Air 1370, 18.7 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Claude Sonnet 4.5 $15.00 against GLM 4.5 Air $1.10 per million output tokens, 13.6x apart.
- Context window
- Claude Sonnet 4.5 takes 1M tokens, GLM 4.5 Air 131K.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | Bars | GLM 4.5 Air | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 3 | 0 | ||
| Intelligence | 1 | 0 | ||
| Reasoning | 4 | 0 | ||
| Math | 2 | 0 | ||
| Knowledge | 4 | 0 | ||
| Web design | 6 | 1 | ||
| General | 17 | 0 | ||
| All shared boards | 37 | 1 |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index30
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE-bench Verified | 74.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| SWE-bench Multilingual | 67.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1394 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| AA Coding Index | 52.1 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 73.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 70.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 22.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 68.4% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 20.5% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| Terminal-Bench | 46.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| GSO-Bench | 14.7% | 2.9% | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| WeirdML | 47.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Cybench | 60.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1488 | 1397 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1473 | 1401 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1386 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1399 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 22 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 20.7 | 11.1 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 146.7 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index12 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 15.8 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building web apps | 1060 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building full-stack apps | 1050 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building mobile apps | 1137 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | Not measured | 46.5% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| METR time horizons | 67.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Remote Labor Index | 2.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| GDPval | 42.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| DeepResearch Bench | 52.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| OSWorld | 62.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | $3,839 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) | 73.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 29 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index40
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 81.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 79.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 73.3% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 7.0% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | 82.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| ARC-AGI | 63.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 13.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| SimpleBench | 54.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Chess puzzles | 10.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | 17.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| EBR-bench | 2.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| VPCT | 39.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1462 | 1379 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1483 | 1370 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1471 | 1388 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 57.9% | 43.0% | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Neither model has a result on the other 6 boards here | |||
MathLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index20
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | 88.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | 94.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| AA Math Index | Not measured | 80.7 | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 80.7% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | 77.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | 23.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | 2.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| ProofBench | 19.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MATH level 5 | 97.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1449 | 1396 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1462 | 1396 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Neither model has a result on the other 2 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index40
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 87.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 84.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| CaseLaw (Vals AI) | 62.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 62.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 73.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 64.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | 94.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 44.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 81.5% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | 30.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1448 | 1407 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1444 | 1402 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1451 | 1382 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1440 | 1371 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| FACTS Benchmark Suite | 40.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 3 boards here | |||
Web designLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index61
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1189 | 1146 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1170 | 1120 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1166 | 1094 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1167 | 1186 | GLM 4.5 Air |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1157 | 1122 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1182 | 1137 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1115 | 1071 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | 1205 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 1 board here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index170
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 36.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 84.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| IFBench | Not measured | 37.6% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | Not measured | 46.7% | Only GLM 4.5 Air measured |
| DTBench | 83.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMCA | 38.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text | 1438 | 1384 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1459 | 1354 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1442 | 1343 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: English | 1450 | 1397 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1425 | 1366 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1460 | 1426 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: German | 1427 | 1377 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1390 | 1348 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1402 | 1308 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: French | 1459 | 1400 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1458 | 1385 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1437 | 1373 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1423 | 1368 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1465 | 1371 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1475 | 1366 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1442 | 1354 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1428 | 1339 | Claude Sonnet 4.5 |
| LMArena Document | 1450 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 22 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 4.5 | GLM 4.5 Air | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
GLM 4.5 Air costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
GLM 4.5 Air costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
GLM 4.5 Air costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | Anthropic Claude Sonnet 4.5 | Z.ai GLM 4.5 Air |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Anthropic | Z.ai |
| Weights | No public weights listed | Open weights |
| Released | September 29, 2025 | July 25, 2025 |
| Context window | 1M | 131K |
| Input $/Mtok | $3.00 | $0.20 |
| Output $/Mtok | $15.00 | $1.10 |
| Coding index | 39.5 | Not benchmarked |
| Independent measurements behind it | 3 | 0 |
| Cost per solved task | $1.16 | Not computable |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Claude Sonnet 4.5 better than GLM 4.5 Air for coding?
Only Claude Sonnet 4.5 has a coding score, 39.5 on the Vibe Coding Index; GLM 4.5 Air has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick GLM 4.5 Air for output tokens 13.6x cheaper ($1.10 vs $15.00 per million) and work measured by Design Arena: data viz, where it leads.
Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GLM 4.5 Air?
Claude Sonnet 4.5 costs $3.00 per million input tokens and $15.00 per million output tokens; GLM 4.5 Air costs $0.20 and $1.10. Cost per solved task is known for Claude Sonnet 4.5 only.
Which has the bigger context window, Claude Sonnet 4.5 or GLM 4.5 Air?
Claude Sonnet 4.5, with 1M tokens against 131K.
How many benchmarks is the Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs GLM 4.5 Air comparison based on?
38 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 22, 2026. Claude Sonnet 4.5's coding index rests on 3 independent benchmarks and GLM 4.5 Air's on 0. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.