o3 vs o4-mini
OpenAI vs OpenAI · Prices checked November 11, 2026
The two are closer than they look: o4-mini at $2.09 per million tokens blended, o3 at $3.80, a 45 per cent difference. A single 100K-input, 10K-output job costs $0.1540 on o4-mini against $0.2800 on o3.
Pricing and capacity
RatesUSD per million tokens. Prices checked November 11, 2026.
| Metric | o3 | o4-mini | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input / 1M tokens | $2.00 | $1.10 | 45% |
| Output / 1M tokens | $8.00 | $4.40 | 45% |
| Blended · 70/30calculated | $3.80 | $2.09 | 45% |
| Blended · 50/50calculated | $5.00 | $2.75 | 45% |
| Blended · 80/20calculated | $3.20 | $1.76 | 45% |
| Blended · 20/80calculated | $6.80 | $3.74 | 45% |
| Job cost · 100K + 10Kcalculated | $0.2800 | $0.1540 | 45% |
| Job cost · 1M + 100Kcalculated | $2.80 | $1.54 | 45% |
| Context window | 200,000 | 200,000 | level |
Input and output rates are as published by each provider. Blended and job-cost rows are calculated comparison metrics, not published prices — how they are derived.
Of the 6 shared benchmarks, o3 takes 5. The widest gap is on LMArena Elo, where o3 leads by 41 points. Context is level at 200,000 tokens on each side.
Benchmarks
| Benchmark | o3 | o4-mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU | 92.9% | 90% | o3 |
| GPQA Diamond | 83.3% | 81.4% | o3 |
| MATH | 96% | 94% | o3 |
| HumanEval | 87.4% | 97.3% | o4-mini |
| SWE-bench Verified | 69.1% | 68.1% | o3 |
| LMArena Elo | 1432 Elo | 1391 Elo | o3 |
Only suites both models report are listed, so a missing score is never shown as a loss. Figures are provider-published or from public leaderboards and are not independently re-run.
What each model is for
Frequently asked questions
Which is cheaper, o3 or o4-mini?
The two are closer than they look: o4-mini at $2.09 per million tokens blended, o3 at $3.80, a 45 per cent difference. A single 100K-input, 10K-output job costs $0.1540 on o4-mini against $0.2800 on o3. Blended cost weights input at 70% and output at 30%; price your own token split for an exact answer, since the cheaper model on a blended basis is not always cheaper for your workload.
Which performs better, o3 or o4-mini?
Of the 6 shared benchmarks, o3 takes 5. The widest gap is on LMArena Elo, where o3 leads by 41 points. These are the figures each provider or public leaderboard publishes, not results we re-run, and a benchmark average can hide the specific behaviour your workload depends on.
Which has the larger context window, o3 or o4-mini?
Context is level at 200,000 tokens on each side. The context window caps everything in a single request: prompt, retrieved documents, conversation history and the model’s own output all share it.
Can I compare o3 and o4-mini on my own numbers?
Yes. Open both in the side-by-side comparison tool to see every field at once, or use the token calculator to price your actual prompt and monthly request volume against each model. Both are free and need no sign-up.
Price it for your own workload
Related matchups
Terms used on this page
Prices and scores are recomputed on every deploy from the catalogue. Prices checked November 11, 2026.