Recently updated models, rising comparisons, and the AI tools teams are actively switching to — refreshed hourly.
Updated Oct 21, 2026
Rankings refresh dailyScored on 6 criteriaNo paid rankings
Instant answer
Claude Opus 5.5 and GPT-6.1 Sol are the comparisons people are making this month: Anthropic’s new coding leader at $4/$20 against OpenAI’s near-Astra value pick at $2/$10. DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is the open-weight story to watch.
If you have not re-evaluated your AI stack since early 2026, start with the New AI Models 2026 hub, then compare Claude Opus 5.5 and GPT-6.1 Sol against your current default.
Most teams do not need to switch every release cycle, but these pages highlight where quality, access, or cost changed enough to revisit the decision.
Models with the latest pricing, scoring, or capability updates in the directory.
MistralBudget
Mistral Large 4
Mistral's October 6, 2026 flagship, in public preview: a natively multimodal mixture-of-experts model with about 1 trillion total parameters, open weights promised for later in October, at $0.68/$2.09 per 1M.
Verdict
Mistral's open-weight flagship, cheap but still in preview.
Quality score
83%
Pricing
$1.36/1M in
$4.18/1M out
Speed
Balanced
3/5 speed
Context
524k tokens
Hosted preview launched October 6, 2026 on Mistral's API and Mistral Studio; open weights scheduled for late October. Gateway id mistral/mistral-large-4. $0.68/$2.09 per 1M. 524,288 context, 262,144 max output; text and image input. Mixture-of-experts, roughly 1 trillion total parameters (reports of active parameters vary from 49B to 52B). Vals AI index: 48.05%, 32nd of 44. Verified October 10, 2026.
Open weightsMultimodalEuropeanBudgetNew
Best for
European-hosted and open-weight deployments that need a frontier-class model
Anthropic's October 7, 2026 low-cost model and the first Haiku with adjustable reasoning effort — thinking can be switched off for simple requests or raised to max, at $0.10/$0.50 per 1M under 100K input tokens.
Verdict
Anthropic's budget model, now with adjustable reasoning, at $0.10/$0.50.
Quality score
82%
Pricing
$0.10/1M in
$0.50/1M out
Speed
Very fast
5/5 speed
Context
1M tokens
Announced September 28, 2026 alongside Sonnet 5.5; generally available October 7, 2026. Gateway id anthropic/claude-haiku-5.5. Tiered pricing: $0.10/$0.50 per 1M up to 100K input tokens, $0.50/$2.50 above. 1,000,000 context, 128,000 max output. Launch figures as reported by Anthropic: Terminal-Bench 4.0 39.2 (max effort), 31.6 (extra), 12.8 (low); OSWorld 2.1 offline subset 72.4 (Haiku 4.5: 15.7). Verified October 10, 2026.
BudgetFastHigh volumeSub-agentsNew
Best for
High-volume tool use, sub-agents and everyday tasks on a tight budget
Anthropic's September 22, 2026 Opus — a step up from Opus 5 on agentic coding, long-running agent work and vision, at a lower $4/$20 list price and with fewer tokens spent per finished task.
Verdict
Anthropic's new coding default — top SWE-bench Pro score at a lower price than Opus 5.
Quality score
98%
Pricing
$4.00/1M in
$20.00/1M out
Speed
Deliberate
2/5 speed
Context
1M tokens
Released September 22, 2026. Gateway id anthropic/claude-opus-5.5. $4/$20 per 1M (cache read $0.20, cache write $5); Fast mode $8/$40. 1,000,000 context, 128,000 max output, knowledge cutoff June 2026, effort levels low to max. Launch figures as reported by Anthropic: SWE-bench Pro 89.9 (Fable 5.1 81.2, Opus 5 79.2); SWE-bench Multilingual 93.9; Terminal-Bench 4.0 66.4 (xhigh); OSWorld 2.1 81.8; Humanity's Last Exam 67.7; Toolathlon Verified 77.8 (Opus 5 80.6). Verified October 10, 2026.
CodingAgenticFlagship1M contextPremiumNew
Best for
Agentic coding, long-running agents and knowledge work where Opus 5 was the bar
Anthropic's September 28, 2026 Sonnet — built for well-scoped everyday work like features, bug fixes, documents, slides and spreadsheets, priced at $2/$10 and close to Opus 5.5 on most of Anthropic's launch rows.
Verdict
Near-Opus 5.5 quality on scoped work at half the price.
Quality score
96%
Pricing
$2.00/1M in
$10.00/1M out
Speed
Fast
4/5 speed
Context
1M tokens
Released September 28, 2026. Gateway id anthropic/claude-sonnet-5.5. $2/$10 per 1M (cache read $0.10, cache write $2.50). 1,000,000 context, 128,000 max output, knowledge cutoff June 2026. Launch figures as reported by Anthropic (Sonnet 5.5 / Opus 5.5): Terminal-Bench 4.0 70.6 / 66.4; OSWorld 2.1 80.1 / 81.8; Humanity's Last Exam 64.5 / 67.7; GDPval-AA v2.1 1,844 / 1,846. Verified October 10, 2026.
CodingWritingFast1M contextValueNew
Best for
Everyday feature work, bug fixing and polished documents at mid-tier pricing
DeepSeek's September 10, 2026 release, now its top API model: a natively multimodal, MIT-licensed model with 1M context that DeepSeek says beats its own V4-Pro on coding and agent work — V4-Pro traffic has been routed to it since September 14.
Verdict
DeepSeek's open, cheap new default — V4-Pro now routes to it.
Quality score
84%
Pricing
$0.30/1M in
$1.20/1M out
Speed
Fast
4/5 speed
Context
1.0M tokens
Released September 10, 2026; previous V4 Flash and V4 Flash Vision endpoints taken offline the same day. From September 14, 2026, requests to deepseek-v4-pro are served by V4.1 Flash at Flash rates until a V4.1-Pro ships. Gateway id deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash; gateway price $0.30/$1.20 per 1M (varies by host; DeepSeek's own API uses peak and off-peak rates). 1,048,576 context, 32,768 max output on the gateway. Weights on Hugging Face, MIT licence. Verified October 10, 2026.
OpenAI's September 22, 2026 low-cost reasoning model, replacing GPT-5.6 Luna at $0.10/$0.50 per 1M — half the predecessor's price, with the same 1.05M context.
Verdict
OpenAI's budget tier at half the old price.
Quality score
80%
Pricing
$0.10/1M in
$0.50/1M out
Speed
Very fast
5/5 speed
Context
1.1M tokens
Released September 22, 2026 with GPT-6 Sol. Gateway id openai/gpt-6-luna. $0.10/$0.50 per 1M up to 272K input tokens, $0.20/$0.75 above; Flex $0.05/$0.25. 1,050,000 context, 128,000 max output, knowledge cutoff May 18, 2026. Verified October 10, 2026.
BudgetFastHigh volumeNew
Best for
High-volume, focused tasks where cost per call decides the model
OpenAI's September 22, 2026 mid-tier reasoning model, replacing GPT-5.6 Sol at $2/$10, half of GPT-5.6 Sol's $4/$20 promotional rate — a price cut rather than a capability jump, and superseded a week later by GPT-6.1 Sol.
Verdict
A same-price successor to GPT-5.6 Sol, already replaced by GPT-6.1 Sol.
Quality score
92%
Pricing
$2.00/1M in
$10.00/1M out
Speed
Balanced
3/5 speed
Context
1.1M tokens
Released September 22, 2026 with GPT-6 Luna. Gateway id openai/gpt-6-sol. $2/$10 per 1M up to 272K input tokens, $4/$15 above; Flex $1/$5. 1,050,000 context, 128,000 max output, knowledge cutoff April 20, 2026. OpenAI launch figures: AutomationBench 33.2 (~$0.27/task); DeepSWE v1.1 68.8 at max (GPT-5.6 Sol 72.7); OSWorld 2.0 64.4 (GPT-5.6 Sol 66.2). Verified October 10, 2026.
CodingAgenticLong context
Best for
Cost-efficient coding and agent workflows on the OpenAI API
OpenAI's September 29, 2026 DevDay release — a Sol-tier reasoning model that OpenAI says comes close to GPT-6 Astra on agentic coding, computer use and professional work at one fifth of Astra's price.
Verdict
Near-Astra capability at Sol pricing — OpenAI's value pick.
Quality score
95%
Pricing
$2.00/1M in
$10.00/1M out
Speed
Balanced
3/5 speed
Context
1.1M tokens
Released September 29, 2026 at OpenAI DevDay, one week after GPT-6 Sol. Gateway id openai/gpt-6.1-sol. $2/$10 per 1M up to 272K input tokens, $4/$15 above; cached input $0.10. Flex tier $1/$5; Ultrafast tier $12/$60. 1,050,000 context, 128,000 max output. OpenAI did not ship a GPT-6.1 Astra. Available to Plus, Pro, Business, Enterprise and Edu through ChatGPT Work and Codex at launch. Verified October 10, 2026.
CodingAgenticValueLong contextNew
Best for
Agentic coding and computer use when Astra's price is hard to justify
Google: Gemini 4 Argon (batch) — new model available
Google: Gemini 4 Argon (batch) (Google) is now available, superseding Gemini 2.5 Flash. Input: $1.00/1M · Output: $5.00/1M.
new-model
Meta: Llama 3.3 70B Instruct — new model available
Meta: Llama 3.3 70B Instruct (Meta) is now available, superseding Llama 3.1 8B Instruct. Input: $0.10/1M · Output: $0.32/1M.
new-model
Meta: Llama 3.2 3B Instruct — new model available
Meta: Llama 3.2 3B Instruct (Meta) is now available, superseding Llama 3.1 8B Instruct. Input: $0.05/1M · Output: $0.33/1M.
new-model
Google: Gemma 3 27B — new model available
Google: Gemma 3 27B (Google) is now available, superseding Gemma 2 27B. Input: $0.08/1M · Output: $0.35/1M.
new-model
Google: Gemma 3 12B — new model available
Google: Gemma 3 12B (Google) is now available, superseding Gemma 2 27B. Input: $0.05/1M · Output: $0.15/1M.
new-model
Google: Gemma 3 4B — new model available
Google: Gemma 3 4B (Google) is now available, superseding Gemma 2 27B. Input: $0.04/1M · Output: $0.05/1M.
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FAQ
Which AI model is trending right now?
The late-September 2026 releases: Claude Opus 5.5, which posts 89.9% on SWE-bench Pro in Anthropic's table, Claude Sonnet 5.5, and OpenAI's GPT-6.1 Sol, which comes within a point of GPT-6 Astra at a fifth of the price. Claude Haiku 5.5 and GPT-6 Luna are the budget models people are comparing.
What is the newest AI model in 2026?
As of October 11, 2026, the newest major releases are Claude Haiku 5.5 (October 7), Mistral Large 4 in preview (October 6), GPT-6.1 Sol (September 29), Claude Sonnet 5.5 (September 28) and Claude Opus 5.5 with GPT-6 Sol and Luna (September 22). The New AI Models 2026 hub keeps the full release timeline.
How often does this page update?
The model lists and prices on this page refresh hourly from our data. The editorial picks and descriptions are updated by hand when a major model launches or a price changes significantly.
What AI tools are people switching to in 2026?
Teams on Claude are moving to Opus 5.5 and Sonnet 5.5, which are cheaper than the models they replace. OpenAI users are moving to GPT-6.1 Sol for most work. Budget pipelines are moving to Claude Haiku 5.5 and GPT-6 Luna at $0.10 per million input tokens, and open-weight users to DeepSeek V4.1 Flash.