AI Models · Paid vs Paid

Claude Fable 5 Paid vs INMercury 3 Paid

Claude Fable 5 vs Mercury 3 compared — price per token, context window, multimodality, openness and which to choose. Full 2026 breakdown.

Prices & specs refreshed from live data · olud.ai

Open-model prices = cheapest provider via OpenRouter; official maker rates may be higher.

Claude Fable 5PaidAnthropic
$10 /M input
$50 /M outputManaged API (no infra to run)
TypeProprietary
Context window1M tokens
MultimodalYes
Self-hostNo
INMercury 3PaidInception
$0.1 /M input
$0.35 /M outputManaged API (no infra to run)
TypeProprietary
Context window1M tokens
MultimodalNo
Self-hostNo
Choose Mercury 3 for the lower output price ($0.35/M vs $50/M). Choose Claude Fable 5 if you need the larger 1M context window.

Claude Fable 5 vs Mercury 3 specs

SpecClaude Fable 5Mercury 3Winner
MakerAnthropicInception–
TypeProprietaryProprietary–
Context window1M tokens1M tokens= Tie
Input price$10/M$0.1/MINMercury 3
Output price$50/M$0.35/MINMercury 3
Vision / multimodalYesNoClaude Fable 5
Tool / function callingYesYes= Tie
Self-hostableNo (API only)No (API only)–
LicenseProprietaryProprietary–

Price gap & when to choose each

143×cheaper per output token

Mercury 3 is ~143× cheaper than Claude Fable 5 on output tokens ($0.35 vs $50 per M tokens).

Choose Claude Fable 5 if…
  • You want frontier performance through a managed API
  • You value reliability & ecosystem
  • You don't want to manage infrastructure
INChoose Mercury 3 if…
  • You want frontier performance through a managed API
  • You want the lower output price
  • You value reliability & ecosystem
  • You don't want to manage infrastructure

Feature comparison

CapabilityClaude Fable 5Mercury 3
Open weights (downloadable)✗✗
Self-hostable✗✗
Runs fully offline✗✗
Vision / multimodal✓✗
Tool / function calling✓✓
1M+ context window✓✓

Benchmarks: Claude Fable 5 vs Mercury 3

Independent benchmark scores measured by Artificial Analysis. Higher is better (except latency).

Claude Fable 5
Mercury 3
Intelligence index
49.6
–
Coding index
76.5
–
GPQA
92.6%
–
Humanity's Last Exam
55.5%
–
Long Context Reasoning
82.3%
–
SciCode
61%
–
IFBench
63.5%
–
τ²-Bench
98.5%
–
τ-Bench Banking
38.1%
–
Terminal-Bench
84.6%
–
Terminal-Bench Hard
62.9%
–
Speed
0 tok/s
–
Latency
0s
–
Intelligence per $
2.5
–

Benchmark data by Artificial Analysis.

How Claude Fable 5 and Mercury 3 score

🏆 Best value & openness: Mercury 3 (3.2 vs 2.9 / 5)
CriterionClaude Fable 5Mercury 3
Cost-efficiency2.05.0
Context window5.05.0
Openness1.51.5
Self-hosting1.01.0
Multimodality5.03.5

Scores come from live data — output price (cost), context length, open vs closed weights (openness & self-hosting) and vision/tool support (multimodality). Raw task quality isn't scored here; it depends on your benchmark — see the verdict.

What each model is

Claude Fable 5 Paid

Anthropic · Proprietary

Claude Fable 5 is a Mythos-class model from Anthropic, built for autonomous knowledge work and coding. It supports text, image, and file inputs with text output, with reasoning support and...

Mercury 3 Paid

Inception · Proprietary

Mercury 3 is a diffusion-based language model from Inception, and the lab's most capable model to date. It is suited for agentic workflows and real-time applications where latency compounds, such...

Frequently asked questions

Claude Fable 5 vs Mercury 3 — which is cheaper?

Mercury 3 is cheaper on output ($0.35/M vs $50/M).

Which has the larger context window?

Claude Fable 5 offers the larger context window (1M tokens).

Claude Fable 5 vs Mercury 3 — which should I pick in 2026?

Choose Mercury 3 for the lower output price ($0.35/M vs $50/M). Choose Claude Fable 5 if you need the larger 1M context window.

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