The complete breakdown
One developer handed Fable 5 an empty folder and asked for a working multiplayer game server - framework and all - and it built the whole thing in one sitting. That is the model now sitting at the top of your Claude Code picker. So you do what most people do. You pick the newest, biggest name and get back to work. Then the bill arrives, or a two-second typo fix takes the model ninety seconds to think about, and you wonder if you chose wrong. Here's the thing nobody tells you: these are not four sizes of the same model. They think differently, cost wildly different amounts, and answer on completely different clocks. One returns in a second. One will run for fifteen minutes on a single request and you are supposed to let it. Fable 5 is the most capable of the group, but capable is not the same as right for the task in front of you. Use it for a quick rename and you are paying ten times the price to wait ten times as long. So before you touch that picker again, here is exactly how Fable 5 differs from Opus, Sonnet, and Haiku, counting down to the one rule that tells you which to pick every single time. Number ten first.
Watch the episode above for the visual explanation, then use the notes below to revisit each idea, example, and practical move.