Updated July 2, 2026 — both models live
Claude Sonnet 5 vs Fable 5
Anthropic shipped both inside 48 hours: Sonnet 5 launched June 30, 2026, and Fable 5 returned globally on July 1 after its export-control suspension. Same 1M context, a 5x price gap — here is the full side-by-side and when each one is the right call.
Quick verdict
Since July 24, 2026, Opus 5 is the default model on Claude Max. The routing ladder now has three tiers: start at Opus 5, drop to Sonnet 5 when budget or latency matters, and escalate to Fable 5 only for the top tier.
- Opus 5 ($5 / $25 per M) — the default for most work since July 24, 2026.
- Sonnet 5 ($2 / $10 per M, intro pricing through August 31, 2026) — for high-volume, token- or latency-sensitive work where Opus-grade quality is more than enough.
- Fable 5 ($10 / $50 per M) — the narrow escalation for long-horizon agentic, Mythos-grade security coding, and 1M full-repo analysis.
As of August 2026: Sonnet 5's introductory pricing ends August 31, 2026. Fable 5 carries a mandatory 30-day retention and is excluded from zero-data-retention agreements.
The three-tier routing ladder
Since July 24, 2026, Opus 5 is the default on Claude Max. Route by work: Sonnet 5 for volume, Opus 5 for most requests, Fable 5 for the long-horizon extreme.
| Tier | Price per M | Best for | When to escalate |
|---|---|---|---|
Claude Sonnet 5 Budget workhorse — high volume | $2 / $10 (intro, through Aug 31, 2026) | High-volume coding, tool use, browser/terminal agents; latency-sensitive requests | Default when a token or cost budget matters more than peak accuracy |
Claude Opus 5 The default | $5 / $25 | Most routine-to-hard work — coding, agents, analysis | The default on Claude Max since July 24, 2026; escalate only when a task hits its ceiling |
Claude Fable 5 The narrow escalation | $10 / $50 (30-day retention) | Long-horizon agentic, Mythos-grade security coding, 1M full-repo analysis | Escalate for multi-day autonomy, one-shot correctness, or whole-repo context |
Prices are USD per million tokens, as of August 2026. Sonnet 5's intro price runs through August 31, 2026. Fable 5 requires a mandatory 30-day retention and is excluded from zero-data-retention agreements.
Spec-by-spec comparison
| Dimension | Claude Sonnet 5 | Claude Fable 5 |
|---|---|---|
| Tier | Mid-tier — the most agentic Sonnet | Mythos-class, priced a tier above Opus |
| API model ID | claude-sonnet-5 | claude-fable-5 |
| Intro price (in / out per M) | $2 / $10 (through Aug 31, 2026) | $10 / $50 (no intro discount) |
| Standard price | $3 / $15 per M | $10 / $50 per M |
| Context window | 1,000,000 tokens | 1,000,000 tokens |
| Max output | 128K tokens | 128K tokens |
| Availability | All plans — default for Free and Pro; every major cloud and IDE | Pro, Max, Team, select Enterprise — included up to 50% of weekly limits through July 7, then usage credits |
| Best for | High-volume coding, tool use, browser/terminal agents | Hardest reasoning, multi-day autonomy, expert analysis |
Both models use the tokenizer introduced with Claude Opus 4.7, so the price gap below is the real gap — there is no tokenization difference between them to adjust for. (A ~30% upward adjustment applies only when comparing against Opus 4.6 or earlier.) Sources: Anthropic announcements, June 30 – July 1, 2026 and the Claude token-counting documentation.
When to use which
Pick Claude Sonnet 5 when…
- You run high-volume coding, refactors, or tool/browser/terminal agent loops all day
- Cost matters and “close to Opus 4.8” quality is enough
- You want the fast default in Claude Code, Cursor, or Copilot
- You're pre-July-7 budgeting: Sonnet 5 stays cheap after Fable 5 moves to usage credits
Pick Claude Opus 5 when…
- You want the default on Claude Max — most requests route here since July 24, 2026
- You need a strong balance of quality, cost, and latency for daily coding and agents
- You're not hitting a ceiling that only Fable 5 can clear
- You want zero data retention out of the box
Pick Claude Fable 5 when…
- The task is the hardest tier — huge multi-day refactors, one-shot correctness, expert judgment
- Peak reasoning quality justifies paying 5x per token
- You need long-horizon Mythos-class capability that Opus 5 does not cover
- Long-horizon autonomy: Fable 5 sustains multi-day agent runs with file memory
Availability status (July 2026)
Sonnet 5 — live everywhere since June 30, 2026: Claude apps (default for Free/Pro), Claude Code, API, AWS Bedrock, Google Vertex, Microsoft Foundry, Cursor, VS Code, GitHub Copilot, OpenRouter.
Fable 5 — back worldwide since July 1, 2026 after the June 12 export-control suspension: API, Claude apps on paid plans, Claude Code, Cowork; AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Foundry re-enabling. Some routine coding requests temporarily fall back to Opus 4.8.
Sonnet 5 vs Fable 5 FAQ
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