Max Reasoning Effort Nearly Doubles Cost for Minimal Gains

Analysis of Artificial Analysis data shows that maxing out reasoning effort nearly doubles per-task cost while yielding negligible gains on the Intelligence Index — Opus 5.5 at xhigh roughly matches Sonnet 5.5 at max for about half the price.

2026-10-07 ~ 2026-10-07 · 2 related posts

• Max Reasoning Effort Nearly Doubles Cost for Minimal Gains: Opus 5.5 xhigh Matches Sonnet 5.5 max at Half Price — randal_olson · 2026-10-07
• Max reasoning effort nearly doubles cost for minimal Intelligence Index gains — randal_olson · 2026-10-07