Anthropic has launched a newer model, Claude 2.0, we suggest considering this model instead.
For more information, see Comparison of Claude 2.0 to other models and API provider benchmarks for Claude 2.0.
Claude Instant Intelligence, Performance & Price Analysis
Model summary
Intelligence
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index
Speed
Output tokens per second
Input Price
USD per 1M tokens
Output Price
USD per 1M tokens
Verbosity
Output tokens from Intelligence Index
Metrics are compared against models of the same class:
- Non-reasoning models → compared only with other non-reasoning models
- Reasoning models → compared across both reasoning and non-reasoning
- Open weights models → compared only with other open weights models of the same size class:
- Tiny: ≤4B parameters
- Small: 4B–40B parameters
- Medium: 40B–150B parameters
- Large: >150B parameters
- Proprietary models → compared across proprietary and open weights models of the same price range, using a blended 3:1 input/output price ratio:
- <$0.15 per 1M tokens
- $0.15–$1 per 1M tokens
- >$1 per 1M tokens
| Reasoning | No This page shows the non-reasoning version of this model. A reasoning variant may also exist. |
|---|---|
| Input modality | Supports: This information is still being updated |
| Output modality | This information is still being updated |
| Knowledge cutoff | Jan 1, 2023 |
| Context window | 100k ~150 A4 pages of size 12 Arial font |
Claude Instant is among the least intelligent models, but well priced when comparing to other non-reasoning models of similar price. The model has a 100k tokens context window with knowledge up to January 2023.
Claude Instant scores 7 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, placing it at the lower end among comparable models (averaging 11). When evaluating the Intelligence Index, it generated 340k tokens, which is very concise in comparison to the average of 3.0M.
Pricing for Claude Instant is $0.00 per 1M input tokens (competitively priced, average: $0.00) and $0.00 per 1M output tokens (competitively priced, average: $0.00). In total, it cost $0.00 to evaluate Claude Instant on the Intelligence Index.
Intelligence
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index by Open Weights / Proprietary
Intelligence Evaluations
Openness
Artificial Analysis Openness Index: Results
Intelligence Index Comparisons
Intelligence vs. Price
Intelligence Index Token Use & Cost
Output Tokens Used to Run Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index
Cost to Run Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index
Context Window
Context Window
Pricing
Pricing: Input and Output Prices
Intelligence vs. Price (Log Scale)
Pricing Comparison of Claude Instant API Providers
Speed
Measured by Output Speed (tokens per second)
Output Speed
Output Speed vs. Price
Latency
Measured by Time (seconds) to First Token
Latency: Time To First Answer Token
End-to-End Response Time
Seconds to output 500 Tokens, calculated based on time to first token, 'thinking' time for reasoning models, and output speed
End-to-End Response Time
Model Size (Open Weights Models Only)
Model Size: Total and Active Parameters
Comparisons to Claude Instant
Claude Instant
GPT-5.4 (xhigh)
gpt-oss-120B (high)
gpt-oss-20B (high)
GPT-5.2 (xhigh)
GPT-5.3 Codex (xhigh)
GPT-5.4 Pro (xhigh)
Llama 4 Maverick
Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview
Gemini 3 Flash
Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite Preview
Claude Opus 4.6 (max)
Claude Sonnet 4.6 (max)
Claude 4.5 Haiku
Mistral Large 3DeepSeek V3.2
Grok 4.1 Fast
Grok 4.20 Beta 0309
Nova 2.0 Pro Preview (medium)
MiniMax-M2.5
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Nano
Kimi K2.5
K-EXAONEMiMo-V2-Flash (Feb 2026)
K2 Think V2
Mi:dm K 2.5 ProGLM-5
Qwen3.5 397B A17B
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about Claude Instant
Claude Instant was released on March 14, 2023.
Claude Instant was created by Anthropic.
Claude Instant scores 7 (estimated) on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, placing it at the lower end among other non-reasoning models in a similar price tier (median: 11).
When evaluated on the Intelligence Index, Claude Instant generated 340k output tokens, which is very competitive compared to other non-reasoning models in a similar price tier (median: 3.0M).
No, Claude Instant is not a reasoning model. It provides direct responses without extended chain-of-thought reasoning.
Claude Instant supports text only input.
Claude Instant supports text only output.
No, Claude Instant does not support image input. It can only process text.
No, Claude Instant is not multimodal. It only supports text only input.
Claude Instant has a context window of 100k tokens. This determines how much text and conversation history the model can process in a single request.
No, Claude Instant is proprietary. The model weights are not publicly available.
Claude Instant is a proprietary model and Anthropic has not disclosed the model size or parameter count.
Claude Instant achieves a score of 7 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index. This composite benchmark evaluates models across reasoning, knowledge, mathematics, and coding.
Claude Instant has a knowledge cutoff of January 2023. The model's training data includes information up to this date.
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