How Does GPT-4o vs Claude Sonnet Pricing Compare?
GPT-4o: $2.50/$10.00 per 1M tokens. Claude Sonnet 4: $3.00/$15.00. GPT-4o is cheaper on input, same on output. For most workloads, GPT-4o costs 15-20% less.
Side-by-Side Pricing
| Metric | GPT-4o | Claude Sonnet 4 |
|---|---|---|
| Input (per 1M tokens) | $2.50 | $3.00 |
| Output (per 1M tokens) | $10.00 | $15.00 |
| Context window | 128K tokens | 200K tokens |
| Provider | OpenAI | Anthropic |
Cost at Scale
Assuming a typical workload of 1M tokens/day (70% input, 30% output):
- GPT-4o: (700K × $2.50 + 300K × $10.00) / 1M = $4.75/day = ~$143/month
- Claude Sonnet 4: (700K × $3.00 + 300K × $15.00) / 1M = $6.60/day = ~$198/month
GPT-4o saves about $55/month (~28%) at this usage level.
When to Choose Each
- Choose GPT-4o when cost is the primary factor, you need vision capabilities, or your workload is output-heavy
- Choose Claude Sonnet 4 when you need a larger context window (200K vs 128K), longer-form outputs, or prefer Anthropic's safety approach
- Choose neither if your task doesn't need frontier-level quality — Gemini Flash or GPT-4o Mini can be 10-50x cheaper
Cheaper Alternatives
| Model | Input | Output | Savings vs GPT-4o |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPT-4o Mini | $0.15 | $0.60 | ~94% |
| Claude Haiku 3.5 | $0.80 | $4.00 | ~60% |
| Gemini 2.0 Flash | $0.10 | $0.40 | ~96% |
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