Claude Opus 4.1 vs Claude Opus 5.5

Wins 0 of 4 benchmarks
$1.34 / task
Wins 2 of 4 benchmarks
Opus 4.112.5
Opus 5.554.7
Opus 4.1—
Opus 5.552.5
Opus 4.1—
Opus 5.561.2
Opus 4.167.9
Opus 5.585.7

Specs

SpecOpus 4.1Opus 5.5
Input, per 1M$15$4
Output, per 1M$75$20
Cost per task?—$1.34
Speed, tok/s—82
Context200K1M
WeightsClosedClosed
ReleasedAug 2025Sep 2026
See images✓✓
Read PDFsPartial✓
Hear audio——
Watch video——
Call tools✓✓
Force a tool callPartial—
Return strict JSON—✓
Search the web?✓
Run code?✓
Use a computer?✓

What breaks when you switch

Opus 4.1 → Opus 5.5
No forced tool use›

Forced tool_choice any or tool returns HTTP 400; remove the forced choice.

Thinking is always on›

Disabled thinking or a manual budget returns HTTP 400; omit thinking or use adaptive thinking.

Remove sampling parameters›

Non-default temperature, top_p or top_k returns HTTP 400; omit these parameters and use prompting.

No assistant prefill›

Assistant prefill returns HTTP 400; use structured outputs or system instructions, with system instructions on Bedrock.

Old computer tool rejected · Claude API / Google Cloud›

The computer_20251124 tool returns HTTP 400 on the Claude API and Google Cloud; use computer_toolset_20260801 there.

Return thinking blocks unmodified›

Edited, reordered or partially dropped thinking blocks return HTTP 400; echo assistant messages complete and unmodified with tool results.

Opus 5.5 → Opus 4.1
Context: 1M → 200K
No strict JSON