High-volume, cost-sensitive work
Choose Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite
Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite costs 13% less on a typical mix of three input tokens for every output token ($0.18 against $0.20 per million tokens).
Claude Haiku 5.5 vs Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: price, context and capabilities
Choose Claude Haiku 5.5 for reasoning over long documents, the latest release and the most recent knowledge. Choose Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite for high-volume, cost-sensitive work and writing and code generation.
In short
- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is 13% cheaper than Claude Haiku 5.5 at the headline price ($0.175 / 1M tokens vs $0.20 / 1M tokens).
- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite reads more per request: 1.05M tokens against 1M.
- Claude Haiku 5.5 is the newer model (October 2026, against July 2025).
Which should you choose?
Each answer below comes straight from the published prices, specifications and independent benchmark results.
Writing and code generation
Choose Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite
Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite charges $0.40 per million output tokens, against $0.50 for Claude Haiku 5.5. Output dominates the bill when answers are long.
Reasoning over long documents
Choose Claude Haiku 5.5
Claude Haiku 5.5 scores 82.7% on Long-context reasoning (AA-LCR), against 32% for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite.
Latest release
Choose Claude Haiku 5.5
Claude Haiku 5.5 is the newer release (October 2026, against July 2025 for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite).
Most recent knowledge
Choose Claude Haiku 5.5
Claude Haiku 5.5 was trained on data up to June 2026, against January 2025 for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite.
Monthly cost at three volumes
| Volume | Claude Haiku 5.5 | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Prototype: 1M input, 250K output tokens | $0.23 | $0.20 | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, $0.03 less |
| Production: 20M input, 5M output tokens | $4.50 | $4.00 | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, $0.50 less |
| Scale: 500M input, 100M output tokens | $100.00 | $90.00 | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, $10.00 less |
Standard rates, without caching or batch discounts. Volumes are per month.
Specifications side by side
| Claude Haiku 5.5 | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | |
| Category | Language models | Language models |
| Status | Generally available | Legacy |
| Headline price | $0.20 / 1M tokens | $0.175 / 1M tokens |
| Input | $0.10 / 1M tokens | $0.10 / 1M tokens |
| Output | $0.50 / 1M tokens | $0.40 / 1M tokens |
| Cached input | $0.01 / 1M tokens | $0.01 / 1M tokens |
| Context window | 1M | 1.05M |
| Max output | 128k | 66k |
| Released | October 2026 | July 2025 |
| Knowledge cutoff | June 2026 | January 2025 |
| Licence | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| Capabilities | Vision, Reasoning, Tool calling, Structured output, Prompt caching, Batch API | Vision, Reasoning, Tool calling, Structured output, Prompt caching, Batch API |
| API model id | claude-haiku-5-5 | gemini-2.5-flash-lite |
Benchmarks side by side
Leader in bold.
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 5.5 | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Humanity's Last Exam | 44.4% | 3.7% |
| Long-context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 82.7% | 32% |
| Intelligence Index | 43.4 | No data |
| SciCode | 55% | No data |
| Terminal-Bench Hard | No data | 2.3% |
| GPQA Diamond | No data | 47.4% |
| IFBench (instruction following) | No data | 31.5% |
| τ²-Bench (agentic tool use) | No data | 19% |
| MMMU-Pro (visual reasoning) | No data | 54% |
Independent evaluations by Artificial Analysis, run the same way for every model, at the reasoning setting shown. Percentages unless marked as an index.
Frequently asked questions
Should I choose Claude Haiku 5.5 or Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite?
Choose Claude Haiku 5.5 for reasoning over long documents, the latest release and the most recent knowledge. Choose Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite for high-volume, cost-sensitive work and writing and code generation.
Which is cheaper, Claude Haiku 5.5 or Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite?
Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is 13% cheaper than Claude Haiku 5.5 at the headline price ($0.175 / 1M tokens vs $0.20 / 1M tokens).
Which has the larger context window, Claude Haiku 5.5 or Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite?
Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite reads more per request: 1.05M tokens against 1M.
What is the difference between Claude Haiku 5.5 and Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite?
Claude Haiku 5.5 is made by Anthropic and Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite by Google. Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is 13% cheaper than Claude Haiku 5.5 at the headline price ($0.175 / 1M tokens vs $0.20 / 1M tokens). Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite reads more per request: 1.05M tokens against 1M. Claude Haiku 5.5 is the newer model (October 2026, against July 2025).
How much do Claude Haiku 5.5 and Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite cost per month?
At 20 million input and 5 million output tokens a month, Claude Haiku 5.5 costs $4.50 and Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite costs $4.00, at standard rates.
Which is newer, Claude Haiku 5.5 or Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite?
Claude Haiku 5.5 was released on October 2026 and Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite on July 2025.