November 2025: The New Benchmark Leaders

Claude 4.5 vs GPT-5.1 vs Gemini 3 Pro — and what Claude 5 must beat

ModelContext WindowSWE-bench VerifiedARC-AGI-2Pricing (Input/Output)Coding
Claude Sonnet 4.5
Released Sept 2025
200K tokens77.2%~23% (est.)$3 / $15
Best
GPT-5.1
Released Nov 2025
400K tokens76.3%~25% (est.)Not disclosed
Excellent
Gemini 3 Pro
Released Nov 2025
1M tokensNot disclosed31.1%Not disclosed
Excellent
Claude 5
Estimated Q2-Q3 2026
500K-1M tokens?90%+?50%+?$3-5 / $15-20?
Near-AGI?
Claude Sonnet 4.5 (Current Best for Coding)
Claude 5 (Projected)
Data Sources (November 2025):
  • SWE-bench Verified: Official leaderboard at swe-bench.github.io
  • ARC-AGI-2: The Algorithmic Bridge, "Google Gemini 3 Is the Best Model Ever"
  • Pricing: Anthropic official documentation (Claude 4.5 only)
  • GPT-5.1 & Gemini 3 pricing not yet publicly disclosed

The November 2025 Landscape: What Changed

November 2025 saw a seismic shift in the LLM market. GPT-5.1 (Nov 13) and Gemini 3 Pro (Nov 18) launched within days of each other, dramatically raising the bar for Claude 5. Here's what Anthropic is up against:

Claude 4.5: Current Coding Champion

With 77.2% on SWE-bench Verified—the highest score ever achieved—Claude Sonnet 4.5 is the undisputed king of coding AI. It achieved 0% error rate on Replit's internal benchmark, demonstrating unprecedented reliability for production code.

Gemini 3: Reasoning Breakthrough

Gemini 3 Pro scored 31.1% on ARC-AGI-2 (the 'IQ test' for AI), a 523% improvement over its predecessor. It won 19 out of 20 benchmarks against Claude 4.5 and GPT-5.1, with a massive 1M token context window.

GPT-5.1: The Balanced Contender

GPT-5.1 achieved 76.3% on SWE-bench and 94% on AIME 2025 (top 0.1% human performance in mathematics). Its adaptive reasoning feature dynamically adjusts thinking time, providing 30% better token efficiency than GPT-5.

What Claude 5 Must Achieve

To stand out in 2026, Claude 5 needs to exceed 85-90% on SWE-bench, reach 500K-1M token context, and maintain Anthropic's reliability advantage. The bar has been raised dramatically by the November 2025 releases.

The Pricing Puzzle

Claude 4.5 costs $3/$15 per million tokens, while GPT-5.1 and Gemini 3 pricing remain undisclosed. If Google or OpenAI undercut Anthropic significantly, Claude 5 will need to compete on either price or performance.

The Developer Market Battle

Developer surveys show Claude 4.5 as 'the most reliable' for production code, GPT-5.1 as 'the best ecosystem,' and Gemini 3 as 'the fastest for UI tasks.' Claude 5 needs a clear differentiation strategy to win market share.

Real-World Performance Snapshot (November 2025)

Best for Coding
Claude Sonnet 4.5
77.2% SWE-bench, 0% error rate
Best for Reasoning
Gemini 3 Pro
31.1% ARC-AGI-2, 19/20 benchmarks
Best Ecosystem
GPT-5.1
Adaptive reasoning, mature integrations

Sources: All data from verified November 2025 releases—TechRadar hands-on testing, InfoQ technical analysis, The Algorithmic Bridge benchmark reports, and official documentation from Anthropic, OpenAI, and Google. Claude 5 specifications are projections based on Anthropic's historical 8-10 month release cycles and competitive positioning requirements.