Grok vs Claude — which actually wins in 2026?
Both sides moved in September: Grok 4.7 shipped on Grok 4.6’s card, Claude Opus 5.5 shipped under Opus 5’s. Claude leads every neutral score here — Intelligence Index 57.6 vs 46.5, Terminal-Bench 4.0 59.6% vs 25.8% — and reads cache at 5% of input. Grok answers on price: $2.00 / $6.00 against $4.00 / $20.00, plus live X and in-thread media.
| Category | Winner | Margin |
|---|---|---|
| General intelligence · AA Intelligence Index v4.3.2 | BClaude | 57.6 vs 46.5 on Artificial Analysis' 10-evaluation composite, read 2026-09-23 (Opus 5.5 at max effort, Grok 4.7 at xhigh) |
| Agentic terminal work · Terminal-Bench 4.0 | BClaude | 59.6% vs 25.8% on AA's uniform harness; on tbench.ai's own board, where each vendor brings its agent, Grok 4.7 via Grok Build scores 37.6% and Opus 5.5 is not yet listed |
| Hard-exam reasoning · Humanity's Last Exam | BClaude | 61.4% vs 43.1% (Artificial Analysis, 2026-09-23) |
| Real-time information · live X and web | AGrok | Grok reads live X posts inline and bills X Search per post fetched; Claude has web search but no X integration |
| Image & video generation · in-product media | AGrok | Grok Imagine generates images and video in-thread; Claude generates no raster media |
| API cost · list rates per 1M tokens | AGrok | $2.00 / $6.00 against $4.00 / $20.00 — half the input, a third of the output |
| Cost per benchmark task · AA cost to run one task | AGrok | $3.74 vs $5.98 to run one Intelligence Index task (AA's per-task series, not its full-run series) |
| Cache economics · cache read as % of input | BClaude | Claude reads cache at 5% of input ($0.20/M), Grok at 25% ($0.50/M) — the blended rates land at $1.19 and $2.58 |
| Context window · API maximum | BClaude | 1M tokens at standard pricing against Grok's 500K, where every rate doubles above a 200K prompt |
| Individual subscription · entry paid tier | BClaude | Claude Pro is $20/mo ($17 annual); the cheapest standalone Grok tier is SuperGrok at $30/mo |
| Ecosystem depth · clients and integrations | BClaude | Desktop apps, Projects, Microsoft 365 and a published MCP stack; Grok is web, mobile and the Grok Build CLI |
| Team & compliance · seats and controls | BClaude | Claude Team is $20–25/seat with Enterprise at $20/seat plus API-rate usage; Grok Business is $30/seat |
| Best overall · for most teams | ·Depends | See the decision tree below |
If you need low API cost, real-time X and in-app media.
- Cost — $2.00/M in and $6.00/M out against Opus 5.5's $4.00 / $20.00
- Cheaper per task — $3.74 against $5.98 to run one Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index task
- Real-time X — live posts read inline, no separate browsing step
- Media — Grok Imagine makes images and video in the same thread; Claude makes none
- Open harness — Grok Build is Apache-2.0 and included on every Grok plan, including Free
If you need coding depth and a long context.
- Measured intelligence — 57.6 against 46.5 on AA's Intelligence Index v4.3.2
- Terminal work — 59.6% against 25.8% on Terminal-Bench 4.0, AA's uniform harness
- Context — a 1M-token window at standard pricing against Grok's 500K, which doubles above a 200K prompt
- Cache and batch — cache reads at 5% of input and batch at half price; Grok 4.7 publishes no batch discount at all
- Compliance — SOC 2, SSO, SCIM, audit logs and a HIPAA-ready Enterprise path
- Reach — desktop apps, Microsoft 365, and first-party availability on Bedrock, Vertex and Foundry
| Aspect | Grok | Claude |
|---|---|---|
| Free tierwhat $0 buys | $0 · Grok Free Real-time web and X search, voice mode, connectors and Grok Build, all inside limits SpaceXAI does not quantify | $0 · Claude Free Chat on web, desktop and mobile, web search, file creation, code execution and memory; the newest models are paid-only B wins |
| Entry subscriptioncheapest standalone paid tier | $30/mo · SuperGrok Higher limits across Chat, Imagine, Voice and Build, plus image and video generation; the pricing page still names Grok 4.6 as the model it unlocks | $20/mo · Claude Pro $17/mo billed annually ($200 up front); adds Claude Code, Projects, Design/Slides/Docs and Microsoft 365 B wins |
| Power tierfor all-day use | $100/mo · SuperGrok Plus Significantly higher usage, 1080p video and priority access; SuperGrok Heavy sits above it at $300/mo, a price the pricing page does not print | From $100/mo · Max Choose 5x or 20x Pro usage, higher output limits and priority access at peak times |
| API · inputper 1M tokens · from snapshot | $2.00 A wins | $4.00 |
| API · outputper 1M tokens · from snapshot | $6.00 A wins | $20.00 |
| Effective API costBlended workload $/1M · from snapshot | $1.19 A wins | $2.58 |
| API context windowMax input tokens · from snapshot | 500K | 1M B wins |
| Real cost / 1M charsTokenizer-adjusted prose — the tokenizer tax | $0.519 A wins | $1.54 |
| Team / enterpriseper seat | $30/seat · Grok Business Seat management, RBAC, SSO, no training on business content | $20–25/seat · Claude Team $20 annual, $25 monthly for a standard seat; premium seats are $100–125; Enterprise is $20/seat plus usage at API rates B wins |
| Capability | Grok | Claude |
|---|---|---|
| API context window | 500K tokens | 1M tokens |
| Vision / image input | ✓ Images, screenshots, PDFs | ✓ Images, screenshots, PDFs |
| Image generation | ✓ Grok Imagine (to 2K) | ✗ (no native raster gen) |
| Video generation | ✓ Imagine, 15s at 720p | ✗ |
| Voice mode | ✓ Sub-second, 30+ languages | ✓ Mobile voice |
| Real-time X integration | ✓ Native | ✗ (general web only) |
| Web browsing | ✓ Live web + X | ✓ Web search |
| Multi-step agents | ✓ Multi-agent mode | ✓ Agentic + computer use |
| Code execution sandbox | ~ Grok Build (terminal) | ✓ Analysis tool |
| Deep research runs | ~ Not a named feature | ✓ Research |
| Projects / workspaces | ✗ | ✓ Unlimited on Pro |
| Artifacts / canvas | ✓ Canvas for writing | ✓ Artifacts (free + paid) |
| MCP support | ✓ Remote MCP tools, billed per token | ✓ Native |
| Persistent memory | ✓ Across chats | ✓ Across chats |
| Custom instructions | ✓ | ✓ |
| Batch API discount | ✗ (not published for Grok 4.7) | ✓ $2.00 / $10.00 per 1M |
| Prompt caching | ✓ $0.50 / 1M cached in | ✓ $0.50 / 1M cached in |
| Desktop apps | ✗ (web only) | ✓ macOS + Windows |
| Mobile apps | iOS + Android | iOS + Android |
| Office / M365 integration | ✗ | ✓ Microsoft 365 |
| SOC 2 compliance | ✓ Type I & II | ✓ SOC 2 + SSO |
| SSO / SCIM | ✓ Business tier | ✓ Team + Enterprise |
| HIPAA BAA | ~ Enterprise (BAA on request) | ~ Enterprise (HIPAA-ready) |
| No training by default | ✓ Business tier | ✓ Team + Enterprise |
| EU availability | ~ US API regions only; resold on Bedrock and Foundry | ~ US or global API routing; resold on Bedrock, Vertex and Foundry |
The numbers, not the spin.
Grok
Half the input rate and a third of the output rate of Opus 5.5 — native to X, and the only side of this pair that generates images and video.
Strengths
- Price per token — $2.00 in and $6.00 out, against $4.00 and $20.00
- Real-time X — reads live posts and breaking news inline, no separate browse step
- Media — Grok Imagine does text-to-image and text-to-video in-thread
- Open harness — Grok Build is Apache-2.0 and ships on every plan including Free
- Cheaper per benchmark task — $3.74 against $5.98 on AA's per-task series
Weaknesses
- Behind on every neutral score in this pair, and by a wide margin on terminal work
- 500K context, and every rate doubles once a prompt reaches 200K tokens
- No batch discount: SpaceXAI's 20% batch tier covers Grok 4.3 and the 4.20 snapshots only
- Cache reads cost 25% of input, five times Claude's share
Best for
- Cost-sensitive API builders who need frontier-class reasoning
- X-native creators, journalists and analysts
- Real-time event coverage and breaking-news research
- In-app image and short-video generation
Claude
Leads every neutral benchmark in this pair and is now cheaper than the Opus it replaced — but still costs twice Grok per token.
Strengths
- Measured lead — 57.6 vs 46.5 on AA's Intelligence Index v4.3.2
- Terminal work — 59.6% vs 25.8% on Terminal-Bench 4.0 under one harness
- Cache — reads at 5% of input, the cheapest share Anthropic has ever charged
- Batch — half price, against no batch discount on Grok 4.7
- 1M context at standard pricing, with no long-context step
Weaknesses
- Twice Grok's input rate and more than three times its output rate
- Thinking cannot be disabled, so reasoning tokens bill as output on every request
- No image or video generation, and no first-party real-time social data
- Migrating from Opus 5 breaks forced tool use and the older computer-use tool
Best for
- Engineers running agents against real repositories
- Long-document and whole-codebase analysis
- MCP-connected and Projects-based workflows
- Teams needing SSO, audit logs and a HIPAA path
Solo founder shipping on the API
You're paying for tokens out of pocket and your agent loop burns output tokens all day. Quality has to be frontier-class, but the bill decides whether the product survives.
Reasoning: Grok 4.7 costs $2.00 in and $6.00 out against Opus 5.5's $4.00 and $20.00, and blends to $1.19/M against $2.58/M on our standard agentic mix. Artificial Analysis' own per-task figure says the same thing from the other end: $3.74 to run one Intelligence Index task against $5.98. You pay roughly half for a model that scores 46.5 against 57.6 on that index, which is the trade this scenario is really about.
Engineer running agents on a real repository
You point a coding agent at a large existing codebase and expect it to read context, patch across files, run tests and iterate without babysitting.
Reasoning: This is the one category with a decisive result. On Terminal-Bench 4.0, run by Artificial Analysis under a single harness for every model, Claude Opus 5.5 scores 59.6% and Grok 4.7 scores 25.8%. The benchmark's own board at tbench.ai, where each vendor brings its best agent, puts Grok 4.7 through Grok Build at 37.6% — better, and still short of what Claude Code scored for the previous Opus. Neither model has a published SWE-bench Verified entry on the neutral boards we track, so repo-level work is measured here by terminal agents, not by SWE-bench.
Journalist covering breaking news on X
You file several stories a day during fast-moving events and need to verify quotes and pull live reactions from X in minutes.
Reasoning: Grok reads live X posts inline, so you skip the copy-paste from a separate browser tab. Claude has web search but no X integration at all, which makes it a second step rather than a tool. For time-to-publish on X-driven stories this isn't close.
Analyst reading 400-page filings
You drop entire annual reports, contracts or research corpora into one thread and ask questions that span the whole document.
Reasoning: Claude's 1M-token window is double Grok's 500K at standard pricing, which decides whether a corpus fits in one pass or needs chunking. Weigh one caveat: Opus 4.7 and later use a newer tokenizer that can spend up to 35% more tokens on the same text, so the effective gap is narrower than 2× — check the tokenizer-tax row above.
Marketer producing copy plus visuals
You want concepts, captions and the accompanying images or short clips generated in one place rather than stitched across three tools.
Reasoning: Grok Imagine generates 2K images and 15-second video in the same thread; Claude generates no raster media whatsoever. There's no trade-off to weigh — if in-app media matters, only one of these two does it.
Regulated team standardising on one assistant
A compliance-bound team needs seats, SSO, audit logs, a BAA path and a vendor that's cleanly available in the EU.
Reasoning: Claude Team is $20–25/seat against Grok Business at $30/user, and the Enterprise tier adds SCIM, audit logs, a HIPAA-ready offering and a compliance API. SpaceXAI's own docs note the EU API console isn't available, which is disqualifying for EU-based teams before the feature comparison even starts.
Straight from the threads.
I find grok 4.5 slight worse that opus 4.8. I find grok to finish early a bit sometimes and I need extra review steps. I like to architect / plan with opus and code with grok.
Even though Grok costs less up front, it actually ends up costing me more money. The API credits I waste having Sonnet fix Grok's broken code completely wipes out any initial savings.
Grok is genuinely excellent, and in my case I've been using it for heavy tasks where Grok spins up Composer 2.5 subagents. The results have been great, even before factoring in the price.
Frequently asked.
Common questions about this comparison, with sources where they matter.
Q · 01 Is Grok or Claude better overall? +
57.6 and Grok 4.7 at 46.5, and Terminal-Bench 4.0 under AA's uniform harness at 59.6% against 25.8%. Grok charges half the input rate and a third of the output rate, reads live X, and generates images and video, none of which Claude does. If your work is agentic coding, the gap is wide enough that price alone should not decide it; if it is high-volume generation with a human in the loop, it might.Q · 02 Which is cheaper? +
$2.00/M input and $6.00/M output against Opus 5.5's $4.00 / $20.00. The one line where Claude is cheaper is the cache read — 5% of input against Grok's 25% — which is why the blended agentic rates, $1.19 against $2.58, sit closer together than the headline rates do. On subscriptions Claude is cheaper to start: Pro is $20/mo against SuperGrok's $30/mo.Q · 03 Which is better for coding? +
59.6% to 25.8% under Artificial Analysis' uniform harness. Neither model appears on llm-stats.com's SWE-bench Verified leaderboard, so nobody should quote a SWE-bench number for this pair — including us.Q · 04 Is Grok's benchmark parity real? +
57.6 against 46.5 on AA's index and 61.4% against 43.1% on Humanity's Last Exam are gaps well outside measurement noise. Grok 4.7 is two days old at the time of writing and missing from some boards — GPQA Diamond among them — so the picture may fill in, but what exists today is consistent.Q · 05 Which has the larger context window? +
1M tokens against Grok 4.7's 500K, and at standard pricing with no long-context step. Grok's window carries a threshold instead: at or above a 200K-token prompt every Grok rate doubles, for the whole request, which makes the top half of its window cost twice the bottom half.Q · 06 Can Claude generate images or video? +
Q · 07 Can I use both? +
r/cursor describe exactly this split — plan with Opus, execute with Grok.Q · 08 Is Grok available in the EU? +
Q · 09 Which is better for teams? +
$20/seat annual or $25/seat monthly, premium seats are $100–125, and Enterprise is $20/seat plus usage at API rates, with SSO, admin controls and no training on your content. Grok Business is $30/seat with seat management, RBAC, SSO and a no-training commitment for business content. Both were read on the vendors' pricing pages on September 23, 2026.