Alternatives to o3 Mini High

OpenAI LMArena 1336.6 $1.93/M on a balanced workload prices as of 2026-10-06

10 models are higher-scoring or cheaper, with neither dimension worse.

Of the 144 models carrying both an independent score and a published price at the same delivery mode, 79 score at least as high as o3 Mini High and cost no more under at least one listed workload, with at least one of those dimensions improved. 10 match or beat its recorded context, maximum output, input modes, tool use and extended reasoning. 69 have a recorded capability loss, named on every row.

Dominance is not a property of a model. It is a property of a model, a capability lens and a workload, and all three are named on every row. Scores are LMArena Elo, used under CC BY 4.0 from the official dataset; prices are blended per million tokens. A higher score is not a drop-in replacement.

This page is built only while a candidate improves score or price without worsening the other under a listed workload. When that comparison no longer holds, it is not generated.

Where it holds

Workloado3 Mini High $/MRecorded capabilities preservedRecorded capability losses
Balanced$1.93768
Summarise$1.111068
Chat$2.261068
Code gen$3.041068
Agentic$1.271069

Workload mixes are defined on the methodology page. Cached input is priced at the cached rate, and reasoning tokens at the worse of the reasoning and output rates.

What you would be replacing

Intelligence1336.6
Context window200K
Max output100K
Input modestext, file
Tool useyes
Extended reasoningyes

Preserving recorded capabilities requires matching or beating these fields. Full record for o3 Mini High, or check o3 Mini High against the whole catalogue.

Recorded capabilities preserved 10

Each option has a higher score or a lower price, with neither dimension worse under the listed workloads. It matches or beats o3 Mini High on recorded context, maximum output, input modes, tool use and extended reasoning.

#ModelIntelligence$/MHolds under
1GPT-5.6 Luna OpenAI1431 +94.4$0.450
  • Balanced −77%
  • Summarise −82%
  • Chat −76%
  • Code gen −74%
  • Agentic −81%
2GPT-5.4 Mini OpenAI1411.4 +74.8$1.69
  • Balanced −12%
  • Summarise −33%
  • Chat −9%
  • Code gen −3%
  • Agentic −28%
3GPT-6 Luna OpenAI1391.5 +54.9$0.200
  • Balanced −90%
  • Summarise −91%
  • Chat −90%
  • Code gen −89%
  • Agentic −92%
4Grok 4.3 xAI1396.7 +60.1$1.56
  • Balanced −19%
  • Summarise −9%
  • Chat −36%
  • Code gen −37%
  • Agentic −36%
5GPT-5.4 Nano OpenAI1372.1 +35.5$0.463
  • Balanced −76%
  • Summarise −82%
  • Chat −75%
  • Code gen −73%
  • Agentic −80%
6GPT-5 Mini OpenAI1373.2 +36.6$0.688
  • Balanced −64%
  • Summarise −75%
  • Chat −61%
  • Code gen −58%
  • Agentic −70%
7o4 Mini OpenAI1353.2 +16.6$1.93
  • Balanced same price
  • Summarise −7%
  • Chat −4%
  • Code gen −1%
  • Agentic −13%
8Muse Spark 1.3 Meta1489.9 +153.3$1.09 summarise
  • Summarise −2%
  • Chat −6%
  • Code gen −2%
  • Agentic −18%
9Muse Spark 1.2 Meta1483.2 +146.6$1.09 summarise
  • Summarise −2%
  • Chat −6%
  • Code gen −2%
  • Agentic −18%
10Muse Spark 1.1 Meta1479.2 +142.6$1.09 summarise
  • Summarise −2%
  • Chat −6%
  • Code gen −2%
  • Agentic −18%

Alternatives with recorded capability losses 69

These improve score or price without worsening the other under the listed workloads, but reduce at least one recorded capability. Read the last column before switching.

ModelIntelligence$/MHolds underRecorded capability loss
MiMo-V2.6-Pro Xiaomi1491 +154.4$0.540
  • Balanced −72%
  • Summarise −70%
  • Chat −79%
  • Code gen −78%
  • Agentic −81%
  • no file input
Gemini 3.6 Flash Google1479.5 +142.9$1.50
  • Balanced −22%
  • Summarise −36%
  • Chat −23%
  • Code gen −18%
  • Agentic −37%
  • 100K → 66K max output
GLM 5.3 Flash Z.ai1469.6 +133$0.238
  • Balanced −88%
  • Summarise −88%
  • Chat −89%
  • Code gen −88%
  • Agentic −90%
  • no file input
GLM 5.3 Z.ai1471.4 +134.8$1.00
  • Balanced −48%
  • Summarise −69%
  • Chat −35%
  • Code gen −30%
  • Agentic −49%
  • no file input
GLM 5.2 Z.ai1470.4 +133.8$1.12
  • Balanced −42%
  • Summarise −62%
  • Chat −31%
  • Code gen −26%
  • Agentic −45%
  • no file input
MiMo-V2.5-Pro Xiaomi1465 +128.4$0.544
  • Balanced −72%
  • Summarise −70%
  • Chat −79%
  • Code gen −78%
  • Agentic −81%
  • no file input
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash DeepSeek1462.5 +125.9$0.182
  • Balanced −91%
  • Summarise −94%
  • Chat −89%
  • Code gen −88%
  • Agentic −92%
  • no file input
MiMo-V2.6-Flash Xiaomi1456.4 +119.8$0.175
  • Balanced −91%
  • Summarise −90%
  • Chat −93%
  • Code gen −93%
  • Agentic −94%
  • no file input
GLM 5.1 Z.ai1461.5 +124.9$1.83
  • Balanced −5%
  • Chat −10%
  • Code gen −12%
  • Agentic −4%
  • no file input
Qwen3.7 Plus Qwen1454.6 +118$0.560
  • Balanced −71%
  • Summarise −73%
  • Chat −72%
  • Code gen −71%
  • Agentic −75%
  • no file input
Kimi K2.6 Moonshot AI1455.5 +118.9$0.961
  • Balanced −50%
  • Summarise −59%
  • Chat −49%
  • Code gen −46%
  • Agentic −57%
  • no file input
Gemma 4 31B Google1443.4 +106.8$0.205
  • Balanced −89%
  • Summarise −86%
  • Chat −89%
  • Code gen −90%
  • Agentic −86%
  • 100K → 16K max output
  • no file input
GLM 5 Z.ai1446.3 +109.7$1.09
  • Balanced −44%
  • Summarise −44%
  • Chat −49%
  • Code gen −48%
  • Agentic −53%
  • no file input
Hy3 Tencent1440.7 +104.1$0.231
  • Balanced −88%
  • Summarise −89%
  • Chat −88%
  • Code gen −88%
  • Agentic −90%
  • no file input
Kimi K2.5 Moonshot AI1445.2 +108.6$1.20
  • Balanced −38%
  • Summarise −48%
  • Chat −37%
  • Code gen −34%
  • Agentic −48%
  • no file input
DeepSeek V4 Pro 0423 DeepSeek1445.2 +108.6$1.21
  • Balanced −37%
  • Summarise −55%
  • Chat −31%
  • Code gen −26%
  • Agentic −45%
  • no file input
Qwen3.8 27B Qwen1440.7 +104.1$0.562
  • Balanced −71%
  • Summarise −84%
  • Chat −63%
  • Code gen −60%
  • Agentic −71%
  • no file input
GLM 4.6 Z.ai1439.9 +103.3$0.760
  • Balanced −61%
  • Summarise −64%
  • Chat −62%
  • Code gen −61%
  • Agentic −67%
  • 100K → 16K max output
  • no file input
Qwen3.5 397B A17B Qwen1438 +101.4$0.878
  • Balanced −54%
  • Summarise −56%
  • Chat −48%
  • Code gen −49%
  • Agentic −46%
  • 100K → 82K max output
  • no file input
Gemma 4 26B A4B Google1433.9 +97.3$0.127
  • Balanced −93%
  • Summarise −94%
  • Chat −93%
  • Code gen −93%
  • Agentic −94%
  • no file input
Qwen3.6 Plus Qwen1436.7 +100.1$0.731
  • Balanced −62%
  • Summarise −63%
  • Chat −57%
  • Code gen −57%
  • Agentic −55%
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
Inkling Thinking Machines1441.8 +105.2$1.73
  • Balanced −10%
  • Summarise −21%
  • Chat −13%
  • Code gen −10%
  • Agentic −25%
  • no file input
GLM 4.7 Z.ai1435.5 +98.9$0.738
  • Balanced −62%
  • Summarise −66%
  • Chat −63%
  • Code gen −61%
  • Agentic −67%
  • no file input
DeepSeek V4 Flash 0423 DeepSeek1432.1 +95.5$0.113
  • Balanced −94%
  • Summarise −93%
  • Chat −95%
  • Code gen −95%
  • Agentic −95%
  • no file input
Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite Google1434.7 +98.1$0.850
  • Balanced −56%
  • Summarise −70%
  • Chat −51%
  • Code gen −47%
  • Agentic −63%
  • 100K → 66K max output
MiniMax M3 MiniMax1432.1 +95.5$0.485
  • Balanced −75%
  • Summarise −77%
  • Chat −76%
  • Code gen −75%
  • Agentic −79%
  • no file input
GLM 5V Turbo Z.ai1437.2 +100.6$1.90
  • Balanced −1%
  • Summarise −4%
  • Chat −10%
  • Code gen −8%
  • Agentic −17%
  • no file input
MiMo-V2.5 Xiaomi1427.5 +90.9$0.175
  • Balanced −91%
  • Summarise −90%
  • Chat −93%
  • Code gen −93%
  • Agentic −94%
  • no file input
GLM 4.5 Z.ai1430.3 +93.7$1.00
  • Balanced −48%
  • Summarise −51%
  • Chat −52%
  • Code gen −50%
  • Agentic −57%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • 100K → 98K max output
  • no file input
R1 0528 DeepSeek1427.9 +91.3$0.920
  • Balanced −52%
  • Summarise −47%
  • Chat −48%
  • Code gen −50%
  • Agentic −41%
  • 200K → 164K context
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
DeepSeek V3.2 DeepSeek1424.5 +87.9$0.290
  • Balanced −85%
  • Summarise −79%
  • Chat −88%
  • Code gen −89%
  • Agentic −84%
  • 200K → 164K context
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
DeepSeek V3.2 Exp DeepSeek1422.4 +85.8$0.305
  • Balanced −84%
  • Summarise −75%
  • Chat −86%
  • Code gen −88%
  • Agentic −77%
  • 200K → 164K context
  • no file input
Qwen3 235B A22B Instruct 2507 Qwen1419.3 +82.7$0.205
  • Balanced −89%
  • Summarise −90%
  • Chat −88%
  • Code gen −88%
  • Agentic −87%
  • 100K → 16K max output
  • no file input
  • no extended reasoning
Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Instruct Qwen1420.1 +83.5$0.370
  • Balanced −81%
  • Summarise −81%
  • Chat −80%
  • Code gen −80%
  • Agentic −80%
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
  • no extended reasoning
DeepSeek V3.1 DeepSeek1419.7 +83.1$0.453
  • Balanced −76%
  • Summarise −72%
  • Chat −75%
  • Code gen −77%
  • Agentic −70%
  • 200K → 164K context
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
Qwen3 Next 80B A3B Instruct Qwen1417.3 +80.7$0.268
  • Balanced −86%
  • Summarise −88%
  • Chat −84%
  • Code gen −83%
  • Agentic −84%
  • no file input
  • no extended reasoning
DeepSeek V3.1 Terminus DeepSeek1417.1 +80.5$0.453
  • Balanced −76%
  • Summarise −72%
  • Chat −75%
  • Code gen −77%
  • Agentic −70%
  • 200K → 164K context
  • no file input
Qwen3.5-122B-A10B Qwen1417.1 +80.5$0.715
  • Balanced −63%
  • Summarise −68%
  • Chat −56%
  • Code gen −55%
  • Agentic −58%
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite Preview Google1415.7 +79.1$0.563
  • Balanced −71%
  • Summarise −78%
  • Chat −70%
  • Code gen −68%
  • Agentic −76%
  • 100K → 66K max output
Gemini 2.5 Flash Google1417 +80.4$0.850
  • Balanced −56%
  • Summarise −70%
  • Chat −51%
  • Code gen −47%
  • Agentic −63%
  • 100K → 66K max output
Qwen3 235B A22B Thinking 2507 Qwen1415.2 +78.6$0.748
  • Balanced −61%
  • Summarise −70%
  • Chat −53%
  • Code gen −52%
  • Agentic −57%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • no file input
Inkling Small Thinking Machines1413.7 +77.1$0.638
  • Balanced −67%
  • Summarise −65%
  • Chat −71%
  • Code gen −71%
  • Agentic −72%
  • no file input
Qwen3.5-27B Qwen1408.9 +72.3$0.536
  • Balanced −72%
  • Summarise −76%
  • Chat −67%
  • Code gen −67%
  • Agentic −68%
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
Qwen3 Max Qwen1412.4 +75.8$1.56
  • Balanced −19%
  • Summarise −32%
  • Chat −18%
  • Code gen −14%
  • Agentic −31%
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
Step 3.5 Flash StepFun1403 +66.4$0.150
  • Balanced −92%
  • Summarise −90%
  • Chat −92%
  • Code gen −93%
  • Agentic −90%
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
MiniMax M2.7 MiniMax1404.6 +68$0.525
  • Balanced −73%
  • Summarise −75%
  • Chat −74%
  • Code gen −73%
  • Agentic −77%
  • no file input
Qwen3.5-Flash Qwen1397 +60.4$0.114
  • Balanced −94%
  • Summarise −93%
  • Chat −94%
  • Code gen −94%
  • Agentic −93%
  • 100K → 66K max output
  • no file input
Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Thinking Qwen1400.7 +64.1$1.30
  • Balanced −32%
  • Summarise −48%
  • Chat −18%
  • Code gen −16%
  • Agentic −26%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
Qwen3.5-35B-A3B Qwen1394.4 +57.8$0.355
  • Balanced −82%
  • Summarise −86%
  • Chat −80%
  • Code gen −79%
  • Agentic −83%
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
Solar Pro 4 Upstage1386.2 +49.6$0.525
  • Balanced −73%
  • Summarise −75%
  • Chat −74%
  • Code gen −73%
  • Agentic −77%
  • no file input
Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 Qwen1384.1 +47.5$0.143
  • Balanced −93%
  • Summarise −91%
  • Chat −92%
  • Code gen −93%
  • Agentic −90%
  • no file input
  • no extended reasoning
GLM 4.5 Air Z.ai1383.9 +47.3$0.310
  • Balanced −84%
  • Summarise −88%
  • Chat −83%
  • Code gen −82%
  • Agentic −86%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • 100K → 98K max output
  • no file input
GLM 4.6V Z.ai1376.8 +40.2$0.450
  • Balanced −77%
  • Summarise −77%
  • Chat −79%
  • Code gen −79%
  • Agentic −81%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
DeepSeek V3 0324 DeepSeek1375 +38.4$0.438
  • Balanced −77%
  • Summarise −74%
  • Chat −76%
  • Code gen −77%
  • Agentic −71%
  • 200K → 164K context
  • no file input
  • no extended reasoning
R1 DeepSeek1372.7 +36.1$1.15
  • Balanced −40%
  • Summarise −29%
  • Chat −37%
  • Code gen −41%
  • Agentic −23%
  • 200K → 64K context
  • 100K → 16K max output
  • no file input
Qwen3 Next 80B A3B Thinking Qwen1368.3 +31.7$0.413
  • Balanced −79%
  • Summarise −82%
  • Chat −75%
  • Code gen −74%
  • Agentic −76%
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no file input
gpt-oss-120b OpenAI1365.4 +28.8$0.065
  • Balanced −97%
  • Summarise −97%
  • Chat −96%
  • Code gen −96%
  • Agentic −96%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • no file input
Qwen3 235B A22B Qwen1366.6 +30$0.796
  • Balanced −59%
  • Summarise −53%
  • Chat −56%
  • Code gen −58%
  • Agentic −48%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • 100K → 8K max output
  • no file input
Nova 2 Lite Amazon1361.8 +25.2$0.850
  • Balanced −56%
  • Summarise −63%
  • Chat −48%
  • Code gen −47%
  • Agentic −50%
  • 100K → 66K max output
Gemma 3 27B Google1357.8 +21.2$0.100
  • Balanced −95%
  • Summarise −92%
  • Chat −95%
  • Code gen −96%
  • Agentic −93%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • no file input
  • no extended reasoning
MiniMax M2.5 MiniMax1359.3 +22.7$0.521
  • Balanced −73%
  • Summarise −75%
  • Chat −74%
  • Code gen −73%
  • Agentic −77%
  • no file input
Mercury 2 Inception1355.2 +18.6$0.375
  • Balanced −81%
  • Summarise −81%
  • Chat −83%
  • Code gen −82%
  • Agentic −85%
  • 200K → 128K context
  • 100K → 50K max output
  • no file input
GLM 4.7 Flash Z.ai1350.9 +14.3$0.145
  • Balanced −92%
  • Summarise −94%
  • Chat −92%
  • Code gen −91%
  • Agentic −94%
  • no file input
Qwen3 32B Qwen1340.1 tie$0.130
  • Balanced −93%
  • Summarise −92%
  • Chat −93%
  • Code gen −93%
  • Agentic −91%
  • 200K → 131K context
  • 100K → 16K max output
  • no file input
MiniMax M1 MiniMax1342.8 tie$0.850
  • Balanced −56%
  • Summarise −56%
  • Chat −50%
  • Code gen −51%
  • Agentic −47%
  • 100K → 40K max output
  • no file input
Trinity Large Thinking Arcee1340 tie$0.388
  • Balanced −80%
  • Summarise −80%
  • Chat −82%
  • Code gen −81%
  • Agentic −83%
  • 100K → 80K max output
  • no file input
MiniMax M2 MiniMax1339.9 tie$0.525
  • Balanced −73%
  • Summarise −76%
  • Chat −74%
  • Code gen −73%
  • Agentic −78%
  • no file input
GPT-4.1 Mini OpenAI1340.4 tie$0.700
  • Balanced −64%
  • Summarise −66%
  • Chat −65%
  • Code gen −64%
  • Agentic −68%
  • 100K → 33K max output
  • no extended reasoning
Claude Haiku 4.5 Anthropic1396.1 +59.5$0.944 summarise
  • Summarise −15%
  • Agentic −16%
  • 100K → 64K max output

What this compares, and what it leaves out

  • Quality is LMArena Elo, used under CC BY 4.0 from the official dataset. The 95% confidence interval on a difference between two scores is about ±10.47 points, so a gap smaller than that is marked tie rather than an improvement — see significance bands.
  • 204 further models at this delivery mode carry a price but no independent score. They are absent from the comparison in both directions — unrated is not a zero, and an unmeasured model is neither an alternative nor a worse buy.
  • Retired models are never offered as an alternative, and a model only competes against its own delivery mode: batch trades latency for price, so it is not a like-for-like swap.
  • Nothing here measures latency, throughput, rate limits or how a model behaves on your prompts. Two models with the same index score are not interchangeable.
  • Models with no higher-scoring or cheaper alternative that is no worse on the other axis are on the value frontier. Models with such an alternative are listed here.
Evidence & Ask