GLM-5.3 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5: API price, context and cost per task
Z.ai's GLM-5.3 against Anthropic's Sonnet 5.5 - two models aimed at day-to-day software engineering.
On output, GLM-5.3 is 7.1x cheaper ($1.4 vs $10 per million tokens). On input, GLM-5.3 is 29x cheaper ($0.0699 vs $2 per million tokens). GLM-5.3 reads more per request: 1,048,576 tokens against 1,000,000.
Data updated 2026-11-11 - source: public OpenRouter model list, refreshed daily. Prices in USD, excluding VAT.
Specs and prices side by side
| GLM-5.3 | Claude Sonnet 5.5 | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Z.ai | Anthropic |
| Input, per 1M tokens | $0.0699 | $2 |
| Output, per 1M tokens | $1.4 | $10 |
| Cached input, per 1M | $0.0689 | $0.1 |
| Batch (input / output) | $0.45 / $2 | $1 / $5 |
| Context window | 1,048,576 | 1,000,000 |
| Max output | 943,718 | 128,000 |
| Input types | text | text, images, files |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yes |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes |
| On OpenRouter since | 18 Aug 2026 | 28 Sep 2026 |
Highlighted: the cheaper price or the larger limit. "Not published" means the figure is not in the public model listing yet.
What a month of work costs
Four typical workloads at today's list prices. Reasoning models also bill their thinking as output tokens, so treat output-heavy numbers as a floor.
| Workload | GLM-5.3 | Claude Sonnet 5.5 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Support chatbot10,000 conversations a month, about 1,500 input and 400 output tokens each | $6.65 | $70 | GLM-5.3 11x cheaper |
| Coding agent300 tasks a month, about 80,000 input tokens (code context re-read across steps) and 8,000 output tokens each | $5.04 | $72 | GLM-5.3 14x cheaper |
| Coding agent with caching70% of input served from the prompt cache | $5.02 | $40.08 | |
| Long-document analysis1,000 documents a month, about 50,000 tokens in and a 1,500-token summary out | $5.60 | $115 | GLM-5.3 21x cheaper |
| Content drafting600 articles a month, about 3,000 tokens of brief in and 2,500 tokens of draft out | $2.23 | $18.60 | GLM-5.3 8.4x cheaper |
Price stability over the last 30 days
- GLM-5.3: 7 price changes since 12 Oct 2026. Input ranged $0.039 - $0.08, output $1.4 - $4.8 per million tokens. Volatile: the listed price follows whichever provider OpenRouter currently routes to, so budget with the upper end of the range.
- Claude Sonnet 5.5: no change in the last 30 days.
GLM-5.3: price log
| Date | Input | Output |
|---|---|---|
| 2026-11-05 | $0.0699 | $1.4 |
| 2026-11-02 | $0.08 | $3.6 |
| 2026-10-31 | $0.0699 | $1.4 |
| 2026-10-30 | $0.08 | $3.6 |
| 2026-10-26 | $0.0699 | $1.4 |
| 2026-10-19 | $0.079 | $1.4 |
| 2026-10-12 | $0.079 | $4.8 |
| 2026-10-10 | $0.039 | $4.8 |
What the vendors and benchmarks say
GLM-5.3
"GLM-5.3 is a large-scale reasoning model from Z.ai, built for complex software engineering and long-horizon agent tasks."model card on OpenRouter
Claude Sonnet 5.5
"Claude Sonnet 5.5 is Anthropic's Sonnet-class model for well-scoped everyday work, succeeding Claude Sonnet 5 as a direct upgrade."model card on OpenRouter
- Listed on OpenRouter on 28 September 2026 as the direct successor to Claude Sonnet 5. Source: OpenRouter
Which one to pick
GLM-5.3 is cheaper per token and has a slightly larger window, but accepts text only. Sonnet 5.5 adds image and file input and Anthropic's agent tooling. GLM-5.3 is a reasonable budget alternative for code-only pipelines; check tool-calling reliability on your own tasks before moving agents over.
Cheaper models with a similar context window
Models from our comparison set that cost less than both on a blended basis and support tool calling. They are not equivalent in quality - test before switching.
- GPT-6 Luna (OpenAI): $0.1 / $0.5 per million tokens, 1.05M context
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (DeepSeek): $0.051 / $0.567 per million tokens, 1.05M context
Related reading
- Step 5 vs Kimi K3, GLM-5.3, Qwen and DeepSeek Compared
- GLM-5.3 and Z.ai: What It Is, Pricing, Chat and Test Results
- GLM 5.3 Real Cost: Three Numbers Don’t Match the Model Card
- GPT-6.1 Terra vs Claude Sonnet 5.5: Polish Test Results
- Claude Sonnet 5.5: Pricing, Benchmarks, and Tested Performance
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 Context Window: 1 Million Token Capacity
How we calculate
Prices are the public per-token list rates from OpenRouter's model list, which match the vendors' own API prices for first-party models and show the current routed price for open-weight models served by several hosts. Monthly costs multiply those rates by the token volumes in each workload; caching assumes the stated share of input is billed at the cached-input rate. Benchmarks and claims are quoted from the named sources, mostly the vendors themselves - treat them as a guide and test on your own tasks. See also the AI cost calculator and all tracked model prices.
Frequently asked questions
Which is cheaper, GLM-5.3 or Claude Sonnet 5.5?
As of 11 Nov 2026, GLM-5.3 costs $0.0699 per million input tokens and $1.4 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 5.5 costs $2 and $10. GLM-5.3 is cheaper in 4 of the 4 monthly workloads we price on this page. The real bill also depends on how many reasoning tokens each model writes.
Which has the larger context window?
GLM-5.3 reads up to 1,048,576 tokens and can write up to 943,718; Claude Sonnet 5.5 reads up to 1,000,000 and writes up to 128,000.
How much does a support chatbot cost on each model?
For 10,000 conversations a month (about 15 million input and 4 million output tokens) you would pay about $6.65 on GLM-5.3 and $70 on Claude Sonnet 5.5 at list prices, before any caching or batch discounts.
Do they offer prompt caching or batch discounts?
GLM-5.3 lists cached input at $0.0689 per million and a batch rate of $0.45 / $2. Claude Sonnet 5.5 lists cached input at $0.1 per million and a batch rate of $1 / $5. Caching matters most for agents and chatbots that resend the same context on every turn.
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