Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max vs Grok 4.7 Xhigh compared

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max leads the intelligence index 54.5 to 35.5. Grok 4.7 Xhigh costs 25% less on blended price. Benchmarks, sample bills, speed and a verdict.

Metric	Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback)	Grok 4.7 (Xhigh)
Intelligence Index	54.5	35.5
Input price (per 1M tokens)	$2.00	$2.00
Output price (per 1M tokens)	$10.00	$6.00
Output speed (tokens/s)	136	65
Time to first token	6.5 min	43s
Release date	2026-09-28	2026-09-21

Metric

Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback)

Grok 4.7 (Xhigh)

Intelligence Index

54.5

35.5

Input price (per 1M tokens)

$2.00

Output price (per 1M tokens)

$10.00

$6.00

Output speed (tokens/s)

136

Time to first token

6.5 min

43s

Release date

2026-09-28

2026-09-21

Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) (Anthropic) and Grok 4.7 (Xhigh) (SpaceXAI) are not peers on the headline index, which makes the trade-offs the interesting part. Their widest difference is the intelligence index, with Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max ahead by 19.0 points (54.5 versus 35.5). No hands-on testing went into this write-up; it summarises the recorded benchmark, price and speed data for both models.

The headline benchmark

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max records 54.5 on the intelligence index and Grok 4.7 Xhigh records 35.5. A gap this large suggests the two are built for different jobs. In relative terms, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max scores 54% higher.

Among 109 active scored models, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max sits 9th and Grok 4.7 Xhigh 38th.

Neither model has a separate coding or math index recorded yet, so those narrower comparisons will have to wait for more data.

Running costs

The list prices are $2.00 in and $10.00 out for Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max, and $2.00 in and $6.00 out for Grok 4.7 Xhigh, per million tokens. That makes Grok 4.7 Xhigh's output 40% cheaper.

For a sample workload of 1 million input tokens and 200,000 output tokens, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max would cost $4.00 and Grok 4.7 Xhigh $3.20, a difference of $0.80. Scale it up to summarising 1,000 documents of 8,000 tokens into 400-token summaries and the bill is $20.00 for Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max against $18.40 for Grok 4.7 Xhigh. On a 3:1 blend of input to output tokens, that works out to $4.00 versus $3.00 per million.

Which is newer

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max arrived on September 28, 2026, 7 days after Grok 4.7 Xhigh (September 21, 2026). They are effectively contemporaries.

Value for money

A blunt value measure, blended price over intelligence score, puts Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max at $0.073 and Grok 4.7 Xhigh at $0.085 per point. With the higher score and the lower cost per point, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max is the better value per point on these numbers.

Throughput and time to first token

Once a response is under way, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max produces roughly 136 tokens per second against 65 tokens per second for Grok 4.7 Xhigh. Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max is ahead by 110% on throughput. Before any text appears, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max takes 6.5 minutes and Grok 4.7 Xhigh 43 seconds. On total time, Grok 4.7 Xhigh wins at ordinary lengths; Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max's higher throughput only pays off beyond about 43,000 tokens. Waits that long are felt on every chat-style request, though they matter less for batch jobs.

Put together, a 1,000-token answer would take about 6.6 minutes from Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max and 59 seconds from Grok 4.7 Xhigh, counting the first-token wait.

Quick answers

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max better than Grok 4.7 Xhigh?

It depends on what you need: Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max scores higher on the intelligence index, 54.5 to 35.5; Grok 4.7 Xhigh is 25% cheaper on blended price; Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max streams output 2.1 times as fast; and Grok 4.7 Xhigh reaches its first token sooner.

Does Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max respond faster than Grok 4.7 Xhigh?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max generates output faster, at 136 tokens per second against 65 tokens per second. Grok 4.7 Xhigh reaches its first token sooner (43 seconds against 6.5 minutes). Counting the first-token wait, Grok 4.7 Xhigh finishes first for any reply shorter than about 43,000 tokens.

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max or Grok 4.7 Xhigh?

Grok 4.7 Xhigh is cheaper on a blended basis. Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max lists $2.00 per million input tokens and $10.00 per million output tokens; Grok 4.7 Xhigh lists $2.00 and $6.00. For 1 million input and 200,000 output tokens that is $4.00 against $3.20.

Who makes Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max and Grok 4.7 Xhigh?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max is made by Anthropic and Grok 4.7 Xhigh by SpaceXAI. Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max was released on September 28, 2026 and Grok 4.7 Xhigh on September 21, 2026.

Where do these numbers come from?

The figures are the recorded benchmark, price and speed data in Franklin AI's model catalogue. This page is written from that data automatically; neither model was tested by hand for it.

Final whistle

Bottom line: Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max has more going for it here, but Grok 4.7 Xhigh is not without an argument. Pick Claude Sonnet 5.5 Max if you need the higher overall score (54.5 against 35.5) and you generate very long outputs, beyond about 43,000 tokens. Pick Grok 4.7 Xhigh if users are waiting on the first word and replies need to finish sooner at typical lengths.

Where the numbers come from

The scores, speed and prices in this comparison come from independent third-party model evaluations that Franklin AI syncs each day, and the article was written from a snapshot of them. For the latest results, open the Claude Sonnet 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) and Grok 4.7 (Xhigh) pages. The AI Benchmark methodology explains how that data is collected and shown.