Claude Opus 4.8 vs Mercury 2
API pricing, context window and capabilities for Claude Opus 4.8 and Mercury 2, side by side. Prices are the cheapest serving route per 1M tokens, verified against LiteLLM and OpenRouter.
Verdict
computed from the published numbersClaude Opus 4.8 wins on intelligence and on context window. Mercury 2 wins on price. Benchmark data is unavailable for one or both models.
Price
Mercury 2
Coding
Not called
Intelligence
Claude Opus 4.8
Context window
Claude Opus 4.8
Key takeaways
who wins on what, from the published numbersClaude Opus 4.8 wins
- Larger context window (1M vs 128K)
- Higher max output (128K vs 50K)
- More serving providers (4 vs 1)
- Supports vision
- Has reasoning mode
Mercury 2 wins
- Cheaper input ($5.00 vs $0.25 /1M)
- Cheaper output ($25.00 vs $0.75 /1M)
Cheaper overall
Mercury 2
$0.25 + $0.75 /1M
Larger context
Claude Opus 4.8
1M
More providers
Claude Opus 4.8
4 providers
Pricing & specs
cheapest serving route · per 1M tokens| Claude Opus 4.8 | Mercury 2 | |
|---|---|---|
| Input $/1M | $5.00 | $0.25 best |
| Output $/1M | $25.00 | $0.75 best |
| Context window | 1M best | 128K |
| Max output | 128K best | 50K |
| Serving providers | 4 best | 1 |
| Released | 2026-05-28 | 2026-02-24 |
Benchmarks
Artificial Analysis indices, side by side| Claude Opus 4.8 | Mercury 2 | |
|---|---|---|
| Intelligence | 55.7 best | 25.3 |
| Coding | 74.3 | Not available |
| GPQA Diamond | 92% best | 77% |
| Output speed | 68 t/s | 602 t/s best |
| Latency (TTFT) | 38.57s | 2.73s best |
Cost calculator
choose a serving route for each sideInput tokens / month
Output tokens / month
Claude Opus 4.8
via Amazon Bedrock
$50
Mercury 2
via Inception
$2.00
Capabilities
feature support, side by side| Feature | Claude Opus 4.8 | Mercury 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Vision | ✓ | — |
| Tool use | ✓ | ✓ |
| Reasoning | ✓ | — |
| Audio | — | — |
| Prompt caching | ✓ | ✓ |
| Structured output | ✓ | ✓ |
| Web search | — | — |
Related comparisons
Frequently asked questions
Which is cheaper, Claude Opus 4.8 or Mercury 2?
Mercury 2 is cheaper for input ($5.00 vs $0.25 per 1M tokens). Mercury 2 is cheaper for output ($25.00 vs $0.75 per 1M tokens).
What is the context window difference between Claude Opus 4.8 and Mercury 2?
Claude Opus 4.8 has a 1M-token context window and Mercury 2 has 128K tokens, so Claude Opus 4.8 can take a larger prompt.
How do Claude Opus 4.8 and Mercury 2 compare on benchmarks?
On the tracked Artificial Analysis indices, Claude Opus 4.8 leads on intelligence.
Pricing verified against LiteLLM + OpenRouter + provider pages · refreshed daily
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