Anthropic offers three Claude models: Haiku, Sonnet, and Opus. Each with different balance between capability, speed, and cost. This guide helps you pick the right one per task.
Overview
| Model | Capability | Speed | Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| Haiku | Good | Very fast | $ |
| Sonnet | Excellent | Fast | $$ |
| Opus | Extraordinary | Moderate | $$$ |
Claude Haiku: speed and volume
The lightest. Ideal for simple high-volume tasks: classification, basic extraction, short summary, first-line chatbots.
Claude Sonnet: the all-rounder
Perfect balance. For 80% of cases, Sonnet is the right choice. Writes very well, reasons well, codes very well, doesn't ruin your bill.
Claude Opus: when max quality matters
The flagship. Better reasoning, better complexity handling, better in ambiguous tasks. Choose for: complex architectural refactor, dense financial or legal analysis, subtle bug debugging.
Choice strategy
A pattern that works: use Sonnet by default, switch to Opus when Sonnet doesn't solve it first try, use Haiku when task is so simple Sonnet is overkill.
Powerful combinations
- Sonnet + Haiku: Sonnet orchestrates, delegates simple tasks to Haiku.
- Opus + Sonnet: Opus for architecture, Sonnet for implementation.
Conclusion
No "best" model, best model per task. Start with Sonnet, adjust as needed. If unsure, test same task in two models and compare.