// alternatives · October 2026
Fugu Ultra alternatives
Cheaper models that come close, budget substitutes, and the cheapest step up — chosen on published LiveBench scores and live list price, never on our opinion. Every model here supports tool calling and image input, as Fugu Ultra does.
LiveBench hasn't published a run for Fugu Ultra. The strongest benchmarked model at a similar or lower price is Claude Opus 5.5, scoring 85.1 overall.
Fugu Ultra: no published LiveBench run, $11.25 per 1M blended tokens, about $4,000/mo for a RAG assistant.
Benchmarked models at or below its price
Fugu Ultra has no published LiveBench run, so these are the highest-scoring benchmarked models priced no more than 25% above it — a known quantity to test against.
| Model | Overall | vs Fugu Ultra | Blended / 1M | RAG assistant | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Claude Opus 5.5anthropic 29% cheaper. Head to head → | 85.1 | — | $8.00−29% | $2,880/mo | 1M |
| GPT-6.1 Solopenai 64% cheaper. Head to head → | 84.1 | — | $4.00−64% | $1,440/mo | 1.1M |
| Claude Sonnet 5.5anthropic 64% cheaper. Head to head → | 80.0 | — | $4.00−64% | $1,440/mo | 1M |
| Gemini 4 Argongoogle 64% cheaper. Head to head → | 79.3 | — | $4.00−64% | $1,440/mo | 1.0M |
| GPT-6.1 Terraopenai 82% cheaper. Head to head → | 77.8 | — | $2.00−82% | $720.00/mo | 1.1M |
| Muse Wondermeta 29% cheaper. Head to head → | 74.2 | — | $8.00−29% | $2,880/mo | 1.0M |
Fugu Ultra alternatives FAQ
What is the best alternative to Fugu Ultra?
Claude Opus 5.5. 29% cheaper. Every suggestion supports tool calling and image input, like Fugu Ultra.
How alternatives are chosen
- Scores — LiveBench release 2026-10-25. Only models with a published run are suggested on quality; a missing model means “not evaluated”, not “worse”.
- Prices — live list prices from OpenRouter, blended 3:1 input:output. Monthly figures price a RAG assistant with the published cached-input rate where there is one.
- Same job — suggestions must support every capability Fugu Ultra has among tool calling and image input. Other listings of the same model (free or batch tiers) are variants, not alternatives, and are left out.
A few points on a public benchmark can hide large differences on your own tasks. Shortlist here, then decide with an eval — how to build one.