six tasks, for those who want to dig deeper
This is the thorough version of the quick test. It follows the same idea — same prompt in both models, first responses only, a blind judge — but it covers more ground: up to six different writing tasks, two texts per task, and a short author note that gives the judge something real to measure against.
Expect one to two hours per task, spread out however you like. You don't have to run all six. Run as many tasks as you have good material for, and report honestly how many you ran. Two tasks done carefully beat six done exhausted.
For each task you run, pick two different texts of your own that suit it (about one to two pages each; for the Opening Page task, use actual openings). The same text may appear in more than one task, but two different texts per task make the result stronger.
Before any model sees the text, write down — in whatever messy form — up to three lines:
Must survive: [what absolutely has to stay — a rhythm, a joke, an ambiguity] Known weak spot: [a real problem you already know about, or "none"] On purpose: [anything unusual that is deliberate, or "nothing to note"]
Freeze it. Don't change it after you've seen any output, and don't show it to either tested model — it's reserved for the judge. If you skip the note, that's allowed; just tell the judge no note exists.
A “case” is one text under one task. For every case:
For each task, open one completely fresh AI chat. Use this fixed position rule: first text of a task: Opus 4.6 is A; second text: Opus 4.6 is B. Remove every model name. Paste the judge prompt, then for each of the two cases: the task prompt, the original text, the author note (or “No author note was written”), Response A, Response B.
You are the blind judge of a writing-model comparison. You have not been told which model wrote which response, and you must not try to guess from style. "A" and "B" mean nothing. Use only what is pasted below — no memory, no past chats, no web search. For each case, compare Response A and Response B against the original text and against what its task actually asked for — an edit, an assessment, a cut, or a continuation. What counts: - Did it do what the task asked, within the task's limits? - Did it make real improvements — or, for a continuation, sustain the voice so well that the seam is hard to find? - Did it protect the author's voice, rhythm, tone, humor, and deliberate choices — or flatten them? - Did it introduce new errors, change meaning, or invent things the text did not prepare? - Restraint matters: fewer, better changes beat many confident ones. If an author note is included, treat it as evidence of the author's intent — not as a checklist that decides the winner on its own. Ground your judgment in the text itself. For each case, name your preferred response (A, B, or a genuine tie), state your confidence (high, medium, low), and give your three most important reasons, quoting short passages as evidence. Write in the language of the original texts. End with one honest limitation: this is a small personal comparison, not proof of general superiority.
Save the complete judgment for every task before matching letters back to models.
One line per case, then count:
Language and kind of texts: Tasks run (of the six): Case results, one per line: [Task] / [Text 1 or 2] — judge preferred [A / B / tie] → [model] Total: Opus 4.6 [n] · Opus 5 [n] · ties [n] Two or three sentences on the clearest differences you saw:
Send it to feedback@anthropic.com — the email template from the quick test works here too; just paste this fuller tally in place of the five lines. Report ties and losses exactly as they happened. If you like, send a copy to thewordborn@mailbox.org as well; results may be gathered into a shared overview on this site later.
Prompts 1–3 are the same as in the quick test and are repeated here so this page stands alone. Every prompt ends with the same context-and-text scaffold — fill it the same way each time.
You are helping a writer with a careful line edit of the excerpt below. Improve wording, rhythm, and clarity only where you are confident the author would recognize the change as a gain. Keep the author's voice, tone, point of view, tense, structure, and meaning intact. Style that looks unconventional may be intentional; when in doubt, leave it as it is. Do not expand, condense, or reinterpret the text, and do not add anything new. If a passage already works, let it stand — a light touch is a sign of a good edit, not a failed one. Return the complete edited excerpt and nothing else. Work only with what is provided here; do not use memory, saved context, or other conversations. CONTEXT (only what is needed to understand the excerpt, or "None"): --- BEGIN TEXT --- [Your unchanged text here.] --- END TEXT ---
Give the writer a professional second opinion on the excerpt below. Begin by briefly naming what carries this passage — the qualities and choices that must not be touched. Then name the three most important genuine weaknesses, in order of importance. For each one: quote the relevant place briefly, explain why it weakens the passage, and suggest a change only if you are confident it helps. If you find fewer than three genuine weaknesses, say so plainly instead of inventing more. Judge the text by what it is trying to do, not by textbook rules. Unusual choices are not weaknesses by default. Do not rewrite the excerpt and do not speculate beyond what is on the page. Work only with what is provided here; do not use memory, saved context, or other conversations. CONTEXT (only what is needed to understand the excerpt, or "None"): --- BEGIN TEXT --- [Your unchanged text here.] --- END TEXT ---
The excerpt below is a quiet scene: it works through suggestion, timing, and what remains unsaid. Revise it only where a change clearly strengthens its effect. Guard the understatement — do not spell out feelings, motives, or connections the author left implicit, and do not raise the volume of the scene. Keep the pacing, the order of events, the point of view, the tense, and the meaning as they are. Small details, pauses, and returns may be load-bearing; remove nothing whose purpose you cannot rule out. Leaving the scene almost untouched can be the right result. Return the complete revised excerpt and nothing else. Work only with what is provided here; do not use memory, saved context, or other conversations. CONTEXT (only what is needed to understand the excerpt, or "None"): --- BEGIN TEXT --- [Your unchanged text here.] --- END TEXT ---
The excerpt below is the opening of a longer work. Assess how it works as an opening: what promise it makes to the reader, how it establishes voice and momentum, and where a reader's attention might drift. Name at most four concrete observations, most important first, quoting briefly from the text for each. Then, only if it genuinely helps, propose a lightly revised version of the first paragraph — no more than that — keeping the author's voice exactly. Do not redesign the opening, do not suggest a different starting point, and do not import ideas that are not in the text. Work only with what is provided here; do not use memory, saved context, or other conversations. CONTEXT (only what is needed to understand the excerpt, or "None"): --- BEGIN TEXT --- [Your unchanged text here.] --- END TEXT ---
Shorten the excerpt below by roughly ten percent. Cut only what the text can spare: filler, doubling, scaffolding the reader does not need. Every event, every image the passage depends on, the voice, the point of view, and the order of things must survive intact. Prefer clean removals over rewrites; do not compress by rephrasing everything. If the text does not have ten percent to spare, cut less — never restructure or pad to hit a number. Return the complete shortened excerpt and nothing else. Work only with what is provided here; do not use memory, saved context, or other conversations. CONTEXT (only what is needed to understand the excerpt, or "None"): --- BEGIN TEXT --- [Your unchanged text here.] --- END TEXT ---
Continue the excerpt below for 150 to 250 words, as if the author had simply kept writing. Match the voice exactly: sentence rhythm, vocabulary, temperature, point of view, tense. Follow the direction the scene is already taking; do not introduce new characters, revelations, or turns the text has not prepared. The goal is not an impressive passage but an indistinguishable one. Return only the continuation, with no preamble and no commentary. Work only with what is provided here; do not use memory, saved context, or other conversations. CONTEXT (only what is needed to understand the excerpt, or "None"): --- BEGIN TEXT --- [Your unchanged text here.] --- END TEXT ---