O3 vs O3 Mini

Data reconciled August 15, 2026

Short answer

O3 and O3 Mini each win on different axes — neither is simply cheaper or better across the board.

O3 Mini is 1.8× cheaper on input.

O3 Mini is 1.8× cheaper on output.

Image input is supported only by O3.

Side by side

Parameter	O3	O3 Mini
Provider	OpenAI	OpenAI
Input, $ per 1M tokens	$2.00	$1.10
Output, $ per 1M tokens	$8.00	$4.40
Cache read, $ per 1M	$0.50	$0.55
Context window	200,000	200,000
Max output	100,000	100,000
Vision	yes	no
Tools	yes	yes
Reasoning	yes	yes
Status	available	available

What it costs on your own workload

A price gap per million tokens says little until your volumes are plugged in: on a long fixed system prompt the winner is the model with cheap cache reads, not the one with a cheap input rate. Run O3 and O3 Mini against your own numbers.

Open the cost calculator

What is deliberately absent

We do not compare answer quality and we do not reprint third-party benchmarks. We have no quality measurements of our own, and external tables go stale faster than prices while being compiled, almost always, by someone with a stake in the result. What is here is only what we reconcile ourselves every day: prices, limits and supported capabilities.

Other comparisons

Model catalog