Which model is better: OpenAI o3 or OpenAI o4-mini?
OpenAI o4-mini is 45.0% cheaper for input tokens ($1.10 vs. $2.00 per 1M tokens) and $4.40 vs. $8.00 for output tokens (1.8x cost advantage). In terms of operational performance, OpenAI o4-mini delivers lower response latency at 680ms TTFT (470ms faster than OpenAI o3) with 125 vs. 82 tok/s throughput. OpenAI o3 leads coding evaluations at 71.7% SWE-bench Verified vs. 68.1% for OpenAI o4-mini and 87.7% vs. 81.4% on GPQA Diamond.
Verified daily via automated API latency tests and official documentation.
Zero-Shot RAG Verified
Verified Performance & Unit Economics Delta (12 Dimensions)
Daily synchronized metrics across token pricing, prompt cache economics, latency, throughput, and 5 capability benchmarks.
Metric / Dimension
OpenAI o3
OpenAI o4-mini
Net Delta / Advantage
Input Cost / 1M Tokens
$2.00
$1.10
OpenAI o4-mini is 1.8x cheaper
Output Cost / 1M Tokens
$8.00
$4.40
OpenAI o4-mini (45.0% lower)
Prompt Cache Read / 1M
$0.500
$0.275
OpenAI o4-mini is 1.8x cheaper
Prompt Cache Write / 1M
$2.00
$1.10
OpenAI o4-mini is 1.8x cheaper
Context Window (Max Output)
205k (100k out)
205k (100k out)
Equal Context Window
Avg TTFT Response Latency
1150ms
680ms
OpenAI o4-mini (470ms faster)
Generation Speed (Throughput)
82 tok/s
125 tok/s
OpenAI o4-mini (+43 tok/s faster)
SWE-bench Verified (Coding)
71.7%
68.1%
OpenAI o3 (+3.6% lead)
GPQA Diamond (PhD STEM)
87.7%
81.4%
OpenAI o3 (+6.3% lead)
MMLU-Pro (Multi-Discipline)
89.8%
85.6%
OpenAI o3 (+4.2% lead)
MATH-500 (Quantitative Logic)
98.6%
97.8%
OpenAI o3 (+0.8% lead)
Inference Value Score (IVR)
60.6 / 100
63.7 / 100
OpenAI o4-mini (+3.1 pts)
Interactive Monthly Token Economics & ROI Forecaster
Model production workloads across prompt, completion, and cached context tokens, or switch models on the fly.
OpenAI o4-mini is cheaper at $1.10/1M input tokens ($4.40/1M output) compared to $2.00/1M input ($8.00/1M output) for OpenAI o3.
Which model has lower TTFT latency and higher tok/s throughput: OpenAI o3 or OpenAI o4-mini?
OpenAI o4-mini delivers faster first-token latency at 680ms TTFT (125 tok/s throughput) compared to 1150ms TTFT (82 tok/s) for OpenAI o3.
How do OpenAI o3 and OpenAI o4-mini compare on SWE-bench coding and GPQA Diamond reasoning?
On SWE-bench Verified software engineering, OpenAI o3 scores 71.7% versus 68.1% for OpenAI o4-mini. On GPQA Diamond graduate-level STEM reasoning, OpenAI o3 scores 87.7% versus 81.4% for OpenAI o4-mini (and 98.6% vs 97.8% on MATH-500).
When should you choose OpenAI o3?
Choose OpenAI o3 (OpenAI) for algorithmic synthesis, mathematical verification, PhD-level scientific research, and multi-step tool planning — offering a 204k context window, 1150ms TTFT, and $2.00/1M input pricing ($0.500/1M cached reads).
When should you choose OpenAI o4-mini?
Choose OpenAI o4-mini (OpenAI) for automated PR review, high-volume agentic coding loops, SQL/data analysis, and visual document reasoning — offering a 204k context window, 680ms TTFT, and $1.10/1M input pricing ($0.275/1M cached reads).
