Claude Opus 4.7 vs GPT-5.4 vs Gemini 3.1 Pro: Which Flagship Wins in April 2026?
Opus 4.7 just retook the lead on SWE-bench Verified (87.6%) but costs 2x GPT-5.4 and Gemini 3.1 Pro. Full pricing, benchmark, and use-case breakdown of the three flagship frontier models.
With Claude Opus 4.7 launching April 16, 2026, all three major frontier providers now have a refreshed flagship in market. Picking between them is less about “who’s the smartest” — they’re all close — and more about price-per-capability for your specific workload.
Here’s the full breakdown of Claude Opus 4.7, GPT-5.4, and Gemini 3.1 Pro across pricing, benchmarks, and use cases.
Quick Pricing Summary
| Claude Opus 4.7 | GPT-5.4 | Gemini 3.1 Pro | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input | $5.00 / 1M | $2.50 / 1M | $2.50 / 1M |
| Cached input | $0.50 / 1M | $0.25 / 1M | $0.625 / 1M |
| Output | $25.00 / 1M | $15.00 / 1M | $15.00 / 1M |
| Context window | 200K (1M beta) | 270K | 2M |
| Batch discount | 50% | 50% | 50% |
Opus 4.7 is 2x the input price and 67% higher on output. That premium needs to pay for itself in your specific workload.
For a deeper cut on each provider, see our individual pages:
Benchmark Head-to-Head (Where It Matters)
| Benchmark | Opus 4.7 | GPT-5.4 | Gemini 3.1 Pro |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE-bench Verified (coding) | 87.6% | ~82% | ~80% |
| SWE-bench Pro (harder coding) | 64.3% | ~55% | ~53% |
| Agentic reasoning | Leader | Strong | Strong |
| OfficeQA Pro (doc reasoning) | 80.6% | ~72% | ~70% |
| Long-context retrieval | Strong (1M beta) | Strong (270K) | Best (2M) |
| Vision resolution | 2,576px / 3.75 MP | 2,000px / 2.6 MP | 3,072px / 4.1 MP |
| Raw throughput | Medium | Fastest | Fast |
Exact numbers for GPT-5.4 and Gemini 3.1 Pro on SWE-bench vary by testing harness and date; these ranges reflect publicly reported results as of mid-April 2026.
The pattern: Opus 4.7 wins the quality benchmarks. GPT-5.4 wins price-performance on general-purpose and high-volume workloads. Gemini 3.1 Pro wins on context length and often on vision tasks involving very high-resolution documents.
Which One Should You Use?
Use Claude Opus 4.7 when:
- Coding is the primary workload. The SWE-bench Verified lead is real and shows up in production.
- Agentic workflows matter. Fewer tool-call errors directly cuts your output token bill.
- Document reasoning is mission-critical. The 80.6% OfficeQA Pro result is not close.
- Instruction adherence matters more than raw speed. Opus 4.7’s literal execution is a feature in regulated or safety-critical settings.
Use GPT-5.4 when:
- Volume is high and margins are thin. Half the price on input beats a 5-point benchmark difference.
- Latency matters. GPT-5.4 is typically the fastest flagship.
- You’re doing general-purpose chat or customer-facing assistants. Quality difference is often imperceptible to end users.
- You already have OpenAI deep-integration and switching cost is high.
Use Gemini 3.1 Pro when:
- Your context is genuinely long. 2M tokens vs 200K/270K means you can fit entire codebases, legal libraries, or video transcripts.
- Vision is a core input and you need the highest pixel budget.
- You’re already in the Google Cloud ecosystem and billing consolidation matters.
Cost Scenario: 10M Input Tokens + 2M Output Tokens per Month
This is a realistic volume for a small-to-mid SaaS app using the flagship for core features.
| Model | Input cost | Output cost | Monthly total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Opus 4.7 | $50.00 | $50.00 | $100.00 |
| GPT-5.4 | $25.00 | $30.00 | $55.00 |
| Gemini 3.1 Pro | $25.00 | $30.00 | $55.00 |
Opus 4.7 is 1.8x more expensive at this volume. At 100M input / 20M output, the gap grows to $1,000 vs $550/month — roughly $5,400/year in your pocket if you can tolerate the ~5-point benchmark drop.
For variable workloads, plug your own numbers into our token cost calculator.
The Cost-Optimization Workaround: Hybrid Routing
Most serious teams don’t pick one flagship. They use all three:
- GPT-5.4 or Gemini 3.1 Pro for bulk generation, chat, simple extraction — ~70% of total volume.
- Claude Sonnet 4.6 ($3.00/$15.00) for mid-tier coding and everyday developer tasks — ~20% of volume.
- Claude Opus 4.7 for quality-sensitive agentic reasoning and hardest coding — ~10% of volume.
This kind of routing typically cuts monthly API spend by 50–65% versus running everything through a single flagship. Our best AI models 2026 guide walks through how to set up routing in detail.
You can also use API aggregators like OpenRouter (routes to all three) to A/B test pricing in real time without code changes.
What About Pricing History?
| Model | Launched | Launch pricing | Current pricing |
|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Opus 4.7 | April 16, 2026 | $5/$25 | $5/$25 |
| Claude Opus 4.6 | February 5, 2026 | $5/$25 | $5/$25 |
| GPT-5.4 | Q1 2026 | $2.50/$15 | $2.50/$15 |
| Gemini 3.1 Pro | Q1 2026 | $2.50/$15 | $2.50/$15 |
All three providers have held prices steady across their latest refreshes. The competitive pressure is showing up in capability improvements, not price cuts. For buyers, that means swapping in the newest model string on your existing provider is usually a no-regret move.
The Verdict for April 2026
- Pure coding quality? Opus 4.7. Try Claude →
- Price-performance for general use? GPT-5.4. Try OpenAI →
- Long context + vision? Gemini 3.1 Pro. Try Gemini →
- Balanced flagship workload? Run all three through a router and measure.
The premium for Opus 4.7 is real but earned. If coding or agentic reliability is on your critical path, the 2x price is cheaper than the engineer-hours saved. If you’re summarizing emails or generating marketing copy, GPT-5.4 saves you a small fortune at imperceptible quality cost.
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Need to offload content generation from your flagship model? Writesonic handles bulk AI writing at a fraction of the API cost — we use it for drafting and route final passes through Opus 4.7.