THE TICKER · HEAD-TO-HEAD · CHECKED DAILY · LAST CHANGE 2026-07-11
CLAUDE FABLE 5 VS CLAUDE OPUS 4.8
Anthropic vs Anthropic, in USD per million tokens, verified daily against public list prices. Same jobs, both meters running.
Claude Fable 5 costs 2.0x more than Claude Opus 4.8 for the same job — a 1,000-token prompt with a 3,000-token reply runs $0.16 vs $0.08. At 1,000 runs a day, that gap is $2,400.00 a month for identical traffic.
SIDE BY SIDE
| Claude Fable 5 → | Claude Opus 4.8 → | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | Anthropic | Anthropic |
| Input / MTok | $10.00 | $5.00 |
| Output / MTok | $50.00 | $25.00 |
| Output multiple | 5.0x | 5.0x |
| 1K prompt + 3K reply | $0.16 | $0.08 |
SAME JOB, BOTH BILLS
| Scenario | Claude Fable 5 | Claude Opus 4.8 | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| A typical prompt | $0.05 | $0.02 | 2.0x |
| A 20-turn conversation | $0.24 | $0.12 | 2.0x |
| Summarizing a 10-page document | $0.24 | $0.12 | 2.0x |
| One agent run | $0.62 | $0.31 | 2.0x |
| A code review request | $0.20 | $0.10 | 2.0x |
Output sizes use the same editorial ratios as the Burn Calculator. Estimates, not invoices — and price is not a benchmark: the cheaper model is only a bargain if it does the job.
SETTLE IT WITH YOUR OWN PROMPT
Paste a real prompt into the Burn Calculator and see what it costs on Claude Fable 5, Claude Opus 4.8 and the other 10 models on the board — plus how much of it is waste either way.