← Back to all comparisons

Claude Opus 4.8 vs Qwen 3.8 Max — Price, Context, and Capability Compared

Verdict

Claude Opus 4.8 costs 3.6× more per blended million tokens than Qwen 3.8 Max. Claude Opus 4.8 has the larger context window (500,000 tokens). Default to Qwen 3.8 Max unless you specifically need Claude Opus 4.8's edge.

Spec comparison

Claude Opus 4.8Qwen 3.8 Max
Price (input)$5.00/M$1.60/M
Price (output)$25.00/M$6.40/M
Blended price$10.00/M$2.80/M
Context window500,000 tokens256,000 tokens
Max output64,000 tokens32,768 tokens
Modalitiestext, visiontext, vision
Reasoning modeYesYes
Released2026-042026-06
Speed58 t/s47 t/s

Cost at scale (3:1 blended)

Tokens / monthClaude Opus 4.8Qwen 3.8 MaxDelta
1,000,000$10.00$2.80$7.20 (3.6×)
10,000,000$100.00$28.00$72.00 (3.6×)
100,000,000$1000.00$280.00$720.00 (3.6×)

Choose Claude Opus 4.8 if…

  • Elite coding and multi-step reasoning
  • Strong instruction following on ambiguous prompts
  • Extended-thinking mode
  • Complex, multi-step tasks where Fable 5’s premium isn’t justified.

Choose Qwen 3.8 Max if…

  • Alibaba’s flagship proprietary model
  • Frontier-class reasoning and long-context understanding
  • Served directly from Alibaba Cloud
  • Frontier-class reasoning outside the US big-lab ecosystem.

Run this exact matchup right now

Send the same prompt to Claude Opus 4.8 and Qwen 3.8 Max side by side and see the outputs yourself.

Try Claude Opus 4.8 vs Qwen 3.8 Max Free

FAQ

Is Claude Opus 4.8 cheaper than Qwen 3.8 Max?

Qwen 3.8 Max is cheaper, at $2.80 per million blended tokens vs $10.00 for Claude Opus 4.8.

Which has the bigger context window, Claude Opus 4.8 or Qwen 3.8 Max?

Claude Opus 4.8 has the larger context window: 500,000 tokens vs 256,000.

Can Claude Opus 4.8 replace Qwen 3.8 Max for coding?

Both are viable for coding. Elite coding and multi-step reasoning (Claude Opus 4.8) vs Alibaba’s flagship proprietary model (Qwen 3.8 Max) — pick based on which strength matters more for your workload.

Which is faster, Claude Opus 4.8 or Qwen 3.8 Max?

Claude Opus 4.8 is faster: 58 t/s vs 47 t/s, measured on our speed benchmarks.

Related

Claude Opus 4.8 pricingQwen 3.8 Max pricingvs Grok 4.3vs Gemini 3.1 Provs Claude Opus 4vs Claude Fable 5Premium model tests

Pricing verified 2026-06-07. Specs verified 2026-08-08.