What's new in Claude Fable 5.2
Anthropic released Claude Fable 5.2 on November 9, 2026, ten weeks after Fable 5.1. It costs less, runs faster, and scores higher on almost every benchmark Anthropic published.
20% cheaper at list
Anthropic lists Fable 5.2 at $8 input and $40 output per million tokens, down from $10 and $50 on Fable 5.1. Cache writes and cache reads drop by the same 20%.
Up to 30% faster output
Anthropic says Fable 5.2 generates output up to 30% faster than Fable 5.1, and uses fewer tokens than Fable 5.1 on tool use and coding at medium effort.
Large gains on agentic coding
Anthropic reports 69.9% on FrontierSWE v2 (Fable 5.1: 56.3%) and 49.1% on FrontierCode 2.0 at xhigh effort (Fable 5.1: 32.4%). On Terminal-Bench-Science 0.1 it reports 74.6%, up from 52.6%.
Fewer false refusals
Anthropic says Fable 5.2 keeps the cyber and biology safeguards of Fable 5.1 but blocks about 55% fewer requests overall. A blocked request returns stop_reason: refusal instead of an answer.
Claude Fable 5.2 vs Fable 5.1 vs Opus 5.5
All of these run on the same AIReiter key, so switching is a change to the model field. Benchmark numbers are Anthropic's own, at each model's highest effort.
Fable 5.2 vs Fable 5.1
Same 1M context, 128K output and always-on thinking. Fable 5.2 is 20% cheaper at list, faster, and ahead on every published benchmark, for example Humanity's Last Exam with tools at 74.2% against 65.6%. Read the migration notes below before you switch: four request shapes changed.
Fable 5.2 vs Opus 5.5
Anthropic still recommends Opus 5.5 as the daily driver for most coding and knowledge work, and Fable 5.2 for harder, open-ended technical work. Fable 5.2 costs twice as much per token. Anthropic reports that at high effort Fable 5.2 scores 45.3% on FrontierCode 2.0, level with Opus 5.5 at 45.5%, for about half the cost per task.
Fable 5.2 vs GPT-6 Astra
Anthropic reports Fable 5.2 ahead on FrontierSWE v2 (69.9% vs 65.5%), OSWorld 2.1 computer use (89.3% vs 79.5%) and Terminal-Bench-Science (74.6% vs 68.1%). These are vendor numbers, so compare on your own tasks.
Claude Fable 5.2 API pricing on AIReiter
Every line is billed at 50% of Anthropic list, at one flat rate across the full 1M-token window.
Half of list on every line
Input $4.00 (list $8.00). Output $20.00 (list $40.00). Cache reads $0.10 (list $0.20). Cache writes $5.00 (list $10.00). All per million tokens.
A real call: $6.00 instead of $12.00
One million input tokens plus one hundred thousand output tokens costs $6.00 here and $12.00 at Anthropic list. The same call on Fable 5.1 here costs $7.50, and on Opus 5.5 here $3.00.
Cache reads are 2.5% of input
Fable models bill cache reads at 0.025 times the input price, lower than the 10% on most Claude models. Long agent sessions that resend the same context get most of their input at $0.10 per million tokens.
Billed on tokens actually used
An estimate is held when the call starts, then settled against the real token count when the response completes, and the difference is returned. Thinking tokens bill as output.
Migrating from Fable 5.1: what now returns an error
Changing the model string to claude-fable-5-2 is enough for most code. Anthropic lists four changes that can break an integration.
Editing earlier turns returns 400
Anthropic's API checks that nothing before a thinking block has changed: the system prompt, the tools and every earlier message. If your code rewrites, reorders or trims history, the request fails with "The block is bound to a different conversation". Keep history append-only and send each assistant turn back exactly as returned.
Thinking blocks do not travel to other models
Only Fable 5.2 and Mythos 5.2 read Fable 5.2 thinking blocks. If a router moves a conversation to Fable 5.1, Opus 5.5 or any other model, those blocks are dropped and that model works without the earlier reasoning.
Computer use and advisor tools
The older computer_20251124 tool returns 400; declare computer_toolset_20260801 instead. With the advisor tool, a Fable 5.2 executor accepts only a Fable 5.2 or Mythos 5.2 advisor.
Rules carried over from Fable 5.1
Thinking is always on: thinking disabled and budget_tokens both return 400. Forced tool use (tool_choice any or tool) returns 400; use auto with strict: true for schema-valid JSON. Leave out temperature, top_p and top_k.
Pick the effort level before you ship
Effort is the only dial for thinking depth on Fable 5.2, and it moves both quality and cost.
The API default is high
If you send no effort, the API runs at high. Claude Code and the Claude apps default to medium. Anthropic says most of the capability gain is already present at high.
Lower effort is often enough
Anthropic reports that at low effort Fable 5.2 matches Opus 5.5's top score on Humanity's Last Exam for under a tenth of the cost per task, and at medium effort it matches Opus 5.5's top WANDR search score for about 40% of the cost.
Prompts cannot turn thinking down
A line like "answer directly without deliberating" does not stop Fable 5.2 from thinking at medium effort and above. If easy turns are slow or expensive, send those turns at low effort.
Use xhigh and max sparingly
Anthropic recommends xhigh for the hardest long-running coding and agent work where you have measured a gain, and max only for measuring the model's ceiling.
How to call the Claude Fable 5.2 API
The endpoint speaks the Anthropic Messages protocol, so an existing Claude client needs only a new base URL and key.
Get a key and point the client at AIReiter
Create an API key in your AIReiter dashboard. In the official Anthropic SDKs set the base URL to https://aireiter.com/api — the SDK adds /v1/messages itself.
Send a request with curl
curl https://aireiter.com/api/v1/messages \ -H "x-api-key: $AIREITER_API_KEY" \ -H "anthropic-version: 2023-06-01" \ -H "content-type: application/json" \ -d '{ "model": "claude-fable-5-2", "max_tokens": 16000, "output_config": {"effort": "high"}, "messages": [{"role": "user", "content": "Hello"}] }'
Or use the Python SDK
from anthropic import Anthropic client = Anthropic(api_key="YOUR_AIREITER_KEY", base_url="https://aireiter.com/api") msg = client.messages.create( model="claude-fable-5-2", max_tokens=16000, messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Hello"}], ) print(next(b.text for b in msg.content if b.type == "text"))
Claude Fable 5.2 API FAQ
/ 01When was Claude Fable 5.2 released, and what is the model ID?
Anthropic released it on November 9, 2026. The API model ID is claude-fable-5-2, and its knowledge cutoff is June 2026. Anthropic says it will not be retired before November 9, 2027.
/ 02What is the context window and max output?
A 1M-token context window and up to 128K output tokens per request, billed at one rate across the whole window. It accepts text and image input and returns text.
/ 03How much does the Claude Fable 5.2 API cost?
Anthropic lists $8 input and $40 output per million tokens, 20% below Fable 5.1. AIReiter charges half: $4 input, $20 output, $0.10 for cache reads and $5 for cache writes.
/ 04Can I turn off thinking?
No. Adaptive thinking is always on, and thinking disabled returns 400. Use a lower effort level to make easy turns faster and cheaper. Thinking tokens count toward max_tokens, so leave room for the answer.
/ 05Why does my multi-turn request return 400?
Most often because something before a thinking block changed: the system prompt, the tools, or an earlier message. Fable 5.2 checks this strictly. Keep history append-only and send assistant turns back unchanged.
/ 06Should I use Fable 5.2 or Opus 5.5?
Start with Opus 5.5 for everyday coding and knowledge work; it costs half as much per token. Move to Fable 5.2 when Opus 5.5 at high effort still falls short, or for hours-long agent runs and deep research.
/ 07What is the difference between Fable 5.2 and Mythos 5.2?
Anthropic says they share one underlying model. Mythos 5.2 has looser cyber and biology safeguards and is limited to organizations in Anthropic's verification programs. Fable 5.2 is open to all API customers.
/ 08Do I need an Anthropic account?
No. An AIReiter key works against the AIReiter endpoint, and you can try the model in the playground on this page before writing any code.