Claude 3.5 Haiku vs o4-mini
A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.
Updated
Claude 3.5 Haiku specs · o4-mini specs- PriceClaude 3.5 Haiku
Claude 3.5 Haiku is roughly 1.1× cheaper on output tokens ($4.00 vs $4.40 per 1M).
- Context windowTie
Both ship a 200K-token context window.
- BenchmarksTie
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores.
- ModalitiesTie
Both handle text, vision.
- OpennessTie
Both are closed-weight, API-only.
On balance Claude 3.5 Haiku edges ahead, winning 1 of 5 categories against o4-mini's 0. Claude 3.5 Haiku is roughly 1.1× cheaper on output tokens ($4.00 vs $4.40 per 1M). Both ship a 200K-token context window.
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores. Both target the same set of modalities (text, vision), so the deciding factors are price, context, and raw quality. Both are closed-weight, API-only.
o4-mini is the newer of the two, released 5 months after Claude 3.5 Haiku, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. Claude 3.5 Haiku is usually picked for customer support and code completion workloads, while o4-mini sees more deployments in reasoning and math. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.
Side-by-side specs
| Spec | Claude 3.5 Haiku | o4-mini |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | OpenAI |
| Released | Nov 2024 | Apr 2025 |
| Modalities | text, vision | text, vision |
| Context window | 200K tokens | 200K tokens |
| Max output | , | , |
| Input · 1M | $0.80 / 1M tokens | $1.10 / 1M tokens |
| Output · 1M | $4.00 / 1M tokens | $4.40 / 1M tokens |
| Knowledge cutoff | , | 2024-06 |
| Open weights | No | No |
| API available | Yes | Yes |
Pricing at scale
What you'd actually pay at typical workloads. Numbers come from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day$8.40 vs $9.90
- Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day$84.00 vs $99.00
- RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day$144 vs $191
Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: $8.40 vs $9.90 per month, model A comes out ahead. Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: $84.00 vs $99.00 per month, model A comes out ahead. RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: $144 vs $191 per month, model A comes out ahead.
Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Claude 3.5 Haiku$0.280
- o4-mini$0.330
Benchmarks compared
Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.
- GPQA,81.4
Claude 3.5 Haiku fits when…
- Fast
- Cheap for Anthropic
- Strong code at small size
o4-mini fits when…
- Strong reasoning at mid-tier price
- Fast for a thinking model
- Solid tool-use
Consider Claude Opus 4.7
Anthropic's mid-2026 flagship, ahead on SWE-bench, agent reliability, and writing quality.
Frequently asked
Is Claude 3.5 Haiku or o4-mini cheaper?
Claude 3.5 Haiku is cheaper at $4.00 / 1M tokens per million output tokens, vs $4.40 / 1M tokens for o4-mini.Which has the larger context window?
Both Claude 3.5 Haiku and o4-mini ship a 200K-token context window.Is Claude 3.5 Haiku or o4-mini better for coding?
Both Claude 3.5 Haiku and o4-mini are competitive on coding benchmarks. See each model's individual spec page for HumanEval and SWE-bench scores where published. For an opinionated pick, consult our Best LLM for Coding ranking.Are either of these models open source?
Neither model ships open weights, both are accessible only via their respective providers' APIs.When were Claude 3.5 Haiku and o4-mini released?
Claude 3.5 Haiku was released by Anthropic on 2024-11-04. o4-mini was released by OpenAI on 2025-04-16.
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