The new budget default for OpenAI API users: faster, cheaper, and smarter than GPT-4o with a context window that punches well above its price tier.
74
Coding
68
Writing
72
Research
0
Images
88
Value
82
Long Context
Use this when
High-volume production workloads — chatbots, summarization pipelines, and document Q&A — where cost efficiency matters more than peak reasoning.
Strengths
Extremely affordable at $0.25/$2 per 1M tokens, undercutting Claude Haiku 3.5 and Gemini 2.0 Flash on price-per-output
400K context window is unusually large for a budget model, enabling full-codebase or long-document analysis
Inherits GPT-5's improved instruction adherence and structured output reliability over GPT-4o
Well-suited for chained agentic tasks where many cheap calls replace a few expensive ones
Weaknesses
Noticeably weaker on complex multi-step reasoning compared to GPT-5, Claude Sonnet 4.6, or Gemini 3.1 Pro
Monthly cost estimate
See what OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini actually costs at your usage level
Input tokens / month1M
10k50M
Output tokens / month500k
10k25M
Input cost
$0.250
Output cost
$1.00
Total / month
$1.25
Based on OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini API pricing: $0.25/1M input · $2/1M output. Real costs vary by provider discounts and caching. Check the provider for exact current rates.
Price History
OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini pricing over time
→0% since May 9
4 data points · tracked daily since May 9, 2026
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High-volume production workloads — chatbots, summarization pipelines, and document Q&A — where cost efficiency matters more than peak reasoning.. Start free — no card required.
Recommendations are made independently based on real-world use and public benchmarks. See our disclosures for details.
Compare alternatives
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AnthropicBalanced
Anthropic: Claude 3.5 Haiku
Claude 3.5 Haiku is Anthropic's fastest and most affordable model in the Claude 3.5 family, designed for high-throughput tasks requiring quick responses without sacrificing Claude's core instruction-following quality. It handles a massive 200K context window while maintaining speed suitable for production pipelines.
Verdict
The fastest way to get Claude's quality in production — just don't confuse 'fast' with 'cheap'.
Quality score
64%
Pricing
$0.80/1M in
$4.00/1M out
Speed
Change history
Pricing moves, ranking shifts, and capability updates.
New ModelMar 27, 2026
OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini — added to UseRightAI
OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini (OpenAI) is now indexed. It supersedes GPT-4o. The new budget default for OpenAI API users: faster, cheaper, and smarter than GPT-4o with a context window that punches well above its price tier.
OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini is best for high-volume production workloads — chatbots, summarization pipelines, and document q&a — where cost efficiency matters more than peak reasoning.. It is a strong fit when that workflow matters more than the tradeoffs around budget pricing and very fast speed.
When should I avoid OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini?
You need deep multi-step reasoning, advanced mathematical problem-solving, or nuanced long-form creative writing — use GPT-5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6 instead.
What is a cheaper alternative to OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini?
Meta: Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is the lower-cost option to compare first when you want a similar workflow fit with less token spend.
What is a faster alternative to OpenAI: GPT-5 Mini?
Anthropic: Claude 3.5 Haiku is the better pick when response time matters more than maximum depth or premium quality.
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Skip this if
You need deep multi-step reasoning, advanced mathematical problem-solving, or nuanced long-form creative writing — use GPT-5 or Claude Sonnet 4.6 instead.
Creative writing quality lags behind full GPT-5 and Claude's writing-tuned models
No native image generation; multimodal input support depends on OpenAI's rollout specifics
Very fast
Best for high-volume, latency-sensitive applications like chatbots, classification, data extraction, and agentic tool use where speed and cost matter more than peak reasoning depth.
Context
200k tokens
Output cost of $4/1M is notably higher than competing fast/mini models. Input cost at ~$0.80/1M is competitive. Best value emerges in input-heavy pipelines like document classification or RAG retrieval where output tokens are minimal.
High-volume, latency-sensitive applications like chatbots, classification, data extraction, and agentic tool use where speed and cost matter more than peak reasoning depth.
OpenAI's latest agentic flagship for coding, research, computer-use workflows, and long multi-step knowledge work.
Verdict
Best OpenAI flagship for agentic coding, research, and computer-use work.
Quality score
94%
Pricing
$5.00/1M in
$30.00/1M out
Speed
Balanced
Best for agentic coding, computer-use workflows, and complex research tasks
Context
1M tokens
Ranked from public benchmark and pricing data verified April 26, 2026: SWE-Bench Pro 58.6%, Terminal-Bench 2.0 82.7%, $5/$30 per 1M tokens, 1M API context.
AgenticCodingComputer useLong contextPremium
Best for
Agentic coding, computer-use workflows, and complex research tasks
Gemma 4 26B A4B is a sparse mixture-of-experts open model from Google, activating only ~4B parameters per forward pass despite having 26B total parameters. It offers a 262K context window at budget pricing, making it one of the more capable open-weight models for its cost tier.
Verdict
A lean, fast, and surprisingly capable budget model best suited for high-volume text tasks where cost efficiency trumps peak quality.
Quality score
59%
Pricing
$0.13/1M in
$0.40/1M out
Speed
Fast
Best for cost-sensitive applications needing long-context processing with reasonable quality, such as document summarization pipelines or lightweight coding assistants.
Context
262k tokens
As an open-weight model, Gemma 4 26B can also be self-hosted, making API pricing largely irrelevant at scale. The 'A4B' suffix denotes the active parameter count in its MoE configuration. Listed as superseding Gemini 3 Flash Preview, though Gemini 2.0 Flash remains a stronger hosted alternative.
Open-weightBudgetMoELong ContextGoogle
Best for
Cost-sensitive applications needing long-context processing with reasonable quality, such as document summarization pipelines or lightweight coding assistants.
