Claude Sonnet 5 vs Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image)
Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) costs 4.0x less per output token than Claude Sonnet 5 ($2.50 vs $10.00 per million). Updated October 21, 2026; no benchmark has tested both models yet.
- Coding
- 57.7
- Overall
- 38.2
- Output $/M
- $10.00
- Coding
- No data
- Overall
- No data
- Output $/M
- $2.50
Claude Sonnet 5 or Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image): which to pick
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a coding score, 57.7 on the Vibe Coding Index; Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) for output tokens 4.0x cheaper ($2.50 vs $10.00 per million).
No benchmark has tested both yet. Claude Sonnet 5 has results on LiveBench coding, LMArena WebDev and AA Coding Index; Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) on Design Arena: images, Design Arena: graphic design and Design Arena: logos. Compare them on price and context instead.
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 5 has a coding score, so no call is made.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a AA Intelligence Index result, 38.2.
Directional only
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a AA Agentic Index result, 43.6.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a GPQA Diamond result, 88.9%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a MMLU Pro result, 87.5%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a Design Arena: websites result, 1274.
Directional only
Image generation
Design Arena: images
No call
Only Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) has a Design Arena: images result, 1179.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Claude Sonnet 5
Claude Sonnet 5 takes 1M tokens against 33K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image)
Claude Sonnet 5 $0.0070, Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) $0.0015 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
No call
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has the number, $1.87.
Directional only
At a glance
- Coding index
- Claude Sonnet 5 57.7 from 6 benchmarks, Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) not benchmarked.
- Widest category
- None yet: no category has been tested on both models.
- Widest single gap
- None yet: no benchmark has tested both models.
- Output price
- Claude Sonnet 5 $10.00 against Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) $2.50 per million output tokens, 4.0x apart.
- Context window
- Claude Sonnet 5 takes 1M tokens, Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) 33K.
Benchmark by benchmark
Every board either model has a result on, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale. Only one model is measured on each, so no row names a leader.
CodingDirectional onlySix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index24 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench coding | 74.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1540 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| AA Coding Index | 71.5 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 82.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 79.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | 10.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 81.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | 44.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | 0.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| IOI (Vals AI) | 45.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | 74.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Vibe Code Bench 1-100 (Vals AI) | 13.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SkillsBench (Vals AI) | 46.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | 70.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SciCode | 54.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| FrontierCode | 42.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| GSO-Bench | 37.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| WeirdML | 68.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| ALE-Bench | 1463.1 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1483 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1474 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1541 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1527 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: from an image | 1540 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 14 boards here | |||
IntelligenceDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index2 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 38.2 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 156.9 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index21 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 43.6 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building web apps | 1245 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building full-stack apps | 1249 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building mobile apps | 1215 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building Android apps | 1225 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building Godot games | 1225 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building games | 1227 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: HTML slides | 1218 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: PowerPoint slides | 1216 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: spreadsheets | 1021 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LiveBench research | 82.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LiveBench browser | 72.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LiveBench long agentic | 39.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SREBench (Vals AI) | 0.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | 53.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | 29.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | 41.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | 66.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Terminal-Bench-Science (Vals AI) | 5.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| APEX-Agents | 54.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | $6,378 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 18 boards here | |||
ReasoningDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index14 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 88.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LiveBench reasoning | 88.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 83.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 91.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 41.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | 90.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SimpleBench | 60.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Chess puzzles | 45.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | 35.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1461 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1489 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1464 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: diagrams | 1293 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: homework | 1311 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 7 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index6 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME | 94.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | 65.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | 29.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| ProofBench | 77.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1467 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1481 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 7 boards here | |||
KnowledgeDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index11 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 87.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 83.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 67.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 75.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 70.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 47.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | 33.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1460 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1442 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1454 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1436 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 6 boards here | |||
Web designDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index9 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1274 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1280 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1278 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1251 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1261 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1276 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1193 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | 1207 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LiveBench design | 82.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
GeneralDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index33 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench data analysis | 71.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | 66.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 48.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 76.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Vals Multimodal Index | 68.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 82.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| DTBench | 92.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMCA | 50.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 60.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text | 1442 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1452 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1416 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision | 1273 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: English | 1450 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1431 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1478 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: German | 1442 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1422 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1412 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: French | 1463 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1438 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1450 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1425 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1453 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1462 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1436 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1411 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: English | 1275 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: Chinese | 1331 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: reading text | 1288 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: humor | 1261 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Vision: creative writing | 1246 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| LMArena Document | 1466 | Not measured | Only Claude Sonnet 5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 13 boards here | |||
Image generationDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index3 boards measured
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: images | Not measured | 1179 | Only Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) measured |
| Design Arena: graphic design | Not measured | 1151 | Only Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) measured |
| Design Arena: logos | Not measured | 1169 | Only Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 2 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
Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) 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 5 | Google Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Anthropic | |
| Weights | No public weights listed | No public weights listed |
| Released | June 30, 2026 | October 7, 2025 |
| Context window | 1M | 33K |
| Input $/Mtok | $2.00 | $0.30 |
| Output $/Mtok | $10.00 | $2.50 |
| Coding index | 57.7 | Not benchmarked |
| Independent measurements behind it | 6 | 0 |
| Cost per solved task | $1.87 | Not computable |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Claude Sonnet 5 better than Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) for coding?
Only Claude Sonnet 5 has a coding score, 57.7 on the Vibe Coding Index; Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) for output tokens 4.0x cheaper ($2.50 vs $10.00 per million).
Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5 or Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image)?
Claude Sonnet 5 costs $2.00 per million input tokens and $10.00 per million output tokens; Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) costs $0.30 and $2.50. Cost per solved task is known for Claude Sonnet 5 only.
Which has the bigger context window, Claude Sonnet 5 or Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image)?
Claude Sonnet 5, with 1M tokens against 33K.
Has any benchmark tested both Claude Sonnet 5 and Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image)?
No benchmark has tested both yet. Claude Sonnet 5 has results on LiveBench coding, LMArena WebDev and AA Coding Index; Nano Banana (Gemini 2.5 Flash Image) on Design Arena: images, Design Arena: graphic design and Design Arena: logos. Compare them on price and context instead. Data as of October 21, 2026.