GPT-5 mini (High) vs GPT-6.1 Sol (Max)
Which is better for the money: GPT-5 mini (High) by OpenAI or GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) by OpenAI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 35.0 points higher (51.8 vs 16.8) but costs 5.7× as much to run the benchmark ($1082 vs $189; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) when you need intelligence above 16.8, and GPT-5 mini (High) when 16.8 is enough.
| Metric | GPT-5 mini (High) | GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 16.8 | 51.8 | +208.3% GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) is 3.1× more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $188.66 | $1,081.55 | +473.3% GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) is 5.7× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 60.90s | 250.67s | +311.6% GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) is 311.6% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.25 / $2.00 | $2.00 / $10.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) vs GPT-5 mini (High): 208.3% more intelligence, 473.3% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 311.6% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- GPT-5 mini (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Haiku 5.5 (Xhigh) scores 41.20 for $158.
- GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) is on today's frontier: nothing is both smarter and cheaper.
GPT-5 mini (High)GPT-6.1 Sol (Max)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/gpt-5-mini/gpt-6-1-sol · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gpt-5-mini/gpt-6-1-sol?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill