Claude Opus 4.8 leads AI chatbots & conversation in 2026 — Intelligence Index 56, $10/M blended. Ranked by response quality, TTFT latency, cost, and throughput. GPT-5.5, Gemini 3 Pro compared.
| # | Model | Score | Benchmarks | Input $/M | Output $/M | Speed | TTFT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Mercury 2 Inception | 87 | 65 | $0.25 | $0.75 | 1194 | 3.02s |
| 2 | 81 | 96 | $0.50 | $3.00 | 209 | 5.83s | |
| 3 | Grok 4.5 (high) SpaceXAI | 80 | 100 | $2.00 | $6.00 | — | — |
| 4 | GPT-5 Codex (high) OpenAI | 79 | 93 | $1.25 | $10.00 | 169 | 7.83s |
| 5 | GPT-5.1 Codex (high) OpenAI | 79 | 89 | $1.25 | $10.00 | 201 | 4.71s |
| 6 | Qwen3.7 Max Alibaba | 78 | 88 | $2.50 | $7.50 | 201 | 1.55s |
| 7 | GLM-5.2 (max) Z AI | 78 | 87 | $1.40 | $4.40 | 189 | 0.91s |
| 8 | Kimi K2 Thinking Kimi | 78 | 87 | $0.60 | $2.50 | 168 | 0.79s |
| 9 | Gemini 3.5 Flash (high) Google | 78 | 89 | $1.50 | $9.00 | 243 | 13.94s |
| 10 | 77 | 84 | $0.25 | $2.00 | 211 | 6.24s | |
| 11 | 77 | 93 | $2.00 | $12.00 | — | — | |
| 12 | Cogito v2.1 (Reasoning) Deep Cogito | 77 | 87 | $1.25 | $1.25 | 94 | 0.47s |
| 13 | MiniMax-M3 MiniMax | 77 | 86 | $0.30 | $1.20 | 104 | 1.54s |
| 14 | KAT-Coder-Pro V1 KwaiKAT | 77 | 86 | $0.30 | $1.20 | 101 | 1.07s |
| 15 | gpt-oss-120b (high) OpenAI | 76 | 77 | $0.15 | $0.60 | 271 | 0.51s |
Models are scored using a weighted combination of benchmarks, pricing, and speed metrics relevant to this use case.
Look for models with the lowest TTFT (Time to First Token). Smaller, faster models typically respond in under 0.5 seconds, while larger models may take 1-3 seconds.
A typical customer support chatbot handling 1,000 conversations/day at ~2K tokens each costs roughly $5-50/day depending on the model. Cheaper models like DeepSeek can significantly reduce costs.
For simple Q&A and FAQ-style chat, fast cheap models work great. For complex support issues requiring reasoning, use a smarter model or implement a routing system that escalates complex queries.