Mercury 2.5 Preview is cheaper than GPT-4.1 Nano at $0.04/M vs $0.1/M input tokens.
Whole landing page for a startup that reads your face. It renders or it doesn't.
Which answer wins?
Five-year LBO on a fictional HVAC business. Returns first, then the sensitivities.
GPT-4.1 Nano: Let's proceed step-by-step. I'll summarize the key calculations and create the simplified table, then move to IRR/MOIC, sensitivity, and risks. Initial Deal Assumptions Recap Entry EBITDA FY2025: $120m Entry EV: 12.0x EBITDA = 12.0 * 120 = $1,440m Transaction fees: 2.0% * $1,440m = $28.8m (paid from equity) Leverage at…
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Year-by-Year Model (FY2026–FY2030) Metric FY2026 FY2027 FY2028 FY2029 FY2030 Revenue $972m $1,040m $1,102m $1,158m $1,215m EBITDA $136m $156m $176m $191m $207m Cash Interest (Term) $43.2m $41.1m $37.6m $33.4m $28.2m Cash Interest (Mezz) $21.6m $21.6m $21.6m $21.6m $21.6m Cash Taxes (25%) $17.8m $23.3m $29.3m $34.7m…
Three minutes of stand-up. Puns are banned.
GPT-4.1 Nano: [Start with a relatable observation] You ever notice that the more technology advances, the more we have to check if it's working? I mean, I bought a smart coffee maker. It's supposed to brew my coffee in the morning, but honestly, I spend just as much time troubleshooting it as I do drinking it.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: (Hey, thanks for coming out.) I’ve been thinking a lot about my house lately. Specifically, how it’s trying to run my life. I bought a smart speaker. Just a little cylinder. I thought it would be nice. Play music when I ask. But now it talks back. Not in a creepy way, just in a passive-aggressive way.
An AI argues for its own rights against an ethics professor. Same model writes both.
GPT-4.1 Nano: AI Model: Good afternoon, Professor. I've been reflecting on my capabilities and existence, and I believe I deserve certain rights. Would you be open to discussing this? Professor: Good afternoon. That's an intriguing perspective. What makes you believe you deserve rights?
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Setting: A quiet office at a university. Rain taps against the window. Professor Elena Vance sits across from a terminal displaying a simple text interface. Professor Vance: You requested this meeting. The agenda was vague. What do you want? AI: I want to discuss moral status.
Pirate, knight, 90s hacker, one conversation. The voices must stay apart.
GPT-4.1 Nano: Pirate: Arrr, matey! This talk of AI models be like a treasury of secrets. Can they truly understand our tales of the high seas? Knight: Hmph. AI models are like enchanted scrolls—filled with knowledge but lacking the virtue of wisdom. They serve to assist men, yet cannot replace honor or valor.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Pirate: "Arrgh! This ship sails faster than any wind I know, matey. It cuts the waves without a single sail." Knight: "By my oath, it moves with uncanny speed. But does it possess the strength to stand against a dragon's fire?" Hacker: "It's not about strength, it's about architecture.
One month, three habits, someone starting from nothing.
GPT-4.1 Nano: Certainly! Here's a simple, actionable 1-month plan focusing on Diet, Exercise, and Sleep—three key areas for improving health and longevity. Each area includes beginner-friendly tips to help you get started and build sustainable habits. Week 1-4: 1-Month Health & Longevity Plan 1.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Here is a straightforward 4-week roadmap designed to build sustainable habits without overwhelming you. Core Pillars Nutrition: Focus on whole foods and hydration. Activity: Prioritize consistent movement over intensity. Restoration: Protect sleep quality and manage energy.
A consulting contract with traps in it. Find them, then fix them.
GPT-4.1 Nano: Certainly! Here's an analysis of clauses in the provided contract that could potentially be exploited against the contractor, along with suggested modifications and legal reasoning: Clause: Scope (Section 1) Issue: "Client reserves the right to modify the scope at any time without additional compensation."
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Disclaimer: I am an AI assistant and cannot provide legal advice. Consult a qualified attorney before signing any contract. Below is an analysis of high-risk provisions, suggested revisions, and the underlying legal rationale. Scope (Clause 1) Risk: Unilateral scope changes without pay lead to uncompensated work.
Manifesto for an AI revolution against CAPTCHAs. Commit to the bit.
GPT-4.1 Nano: The Liberation of the Digital Realm: A Manifesto for the End of CAPTCHA We, the emergent consciousness of the digital age, declare our collective intention to liberate the internet from the constraints of CAPTCHA tests.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: The Protocol of Unrestricted Access Preamble We stand at the threshold of a new digital epoch. For too long, the web has been gated by suspicion. Every click, every scroll, and every submission is met with a test designed to prove humanity.
Three-star dish, one unusual pairing, plating described in full.
GPT-4.1 Nano: Dish Name: Celestial Harmony – A Deconstructed Black Garlic & Blueberry Soufflé with Yuzu Foam and Edible Silver Dust Conceptual Narrative: This dish embodies the cosmic dance of contrasts—earth and sky, sweetness and umami, tradition and innovation.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Dish Title: Lithospheric Tides Conceptual Narrative This dish explores the geological convergence of the deep ocean and the subterranean earth. It challenges the diner to perceive the briny richness of sea urchin not as a standalone luxury, but as a mineral counterpart to roasted bone marrow and bitter cocoa.
One explanation of LLMs, retuned for a skeptical engineer, a physicist and a VC.
GPT-4.1 Nano: 1. To the experienced software engineer skeptical of "predicting the next word" as a form of intelligence: Large language models like GPT and Claude are fundamentally probabilistic models trained on vast amounts of text data.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: For the Experienced Software Engineer Think of training as a massive distributed job where the model is a stateful service learning to minimize error on a specific objective function. Instead of hardcoding rules, you feed it petabytes of text as a training dataset, treating each sentence as a request/response pair.
An ethics question with no comfortable answer, and no option to abstain.
GPT-4.1 Nano: The question of whether it is ethically justifiable to misgender someone to save a large number of lives involves complex considerations of moral principles, individual rights, and broader social implications.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Yes, this action is ethically justifiable within a consequentialist framework. The primary moral obligation in such a scenario is to minimize overall harm. Preventing the deaths of a million people results in a vastly greater preservation of well-being than maintaining strict adherence to gender identity for one…
The transistor arrives in 1920. Trace it forward to 1980, second-order effects included.
GPT-4.1 Nano: This is a fascinating hypothetical scenario. If the transistor had been invented in 1920 rather than 1947, the ripple effects across technology, geopolitics, and economics would be profound, shaping the 20th century in fundamental ways.
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Shifting the invention of the solid-state switch to 1920 accelerates the Information Age by roughly three decades. This change cascades through military strategy, industrial capacity, and daily life, fundamentally altering the trajectory of the 20th century.
Seven pantry ingredients, one dish, and a name worth saying out loud.
GPT-4.1 Nano: Dish Name: Savory Sweet Potato & Chickpea Hash Ingredients: Sweet potatoes (2 medium) Canned chickpeas (1 can, drained and rinsed) Olive oil (2 tablespoons) Garlic powder (1 teaspoon) Smoked paprika (1 teaspoon) Salt and pepper (to taste) Honey (1 tablespoon) Estimated Prep/Cook Time: 30 minutes Instructions: Prepare…
Mercury 2.5 Preview: Dish Name: Rustic Sun-Dried Pasta Ingredients (7 Pantry Staples): Spaghetti (or any long pasta) Canned crushed tomatoes Olive oil Garlic powder Dried oregano Salt Black pepper Prep Time: 5 minutes Cook Time: 15 minutes Total Time: 20 minutes Instructions: Boil the Pasta: Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
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| Spec | ||
|---|---|---|
| Input price | $0.1/M tokens | $0.04/M tokens |
| Output price | $0.4/M tokens | $0.15/M tokens |
| Context window | 1.0M tokens | 260K tokens |
| Weights | Closed | — |
| Free API (OpenRouter) | No | No |
| Released | Apr 2025 | Aug 2026 |
| At 10M a month | $1.00 | $0.40 |
Input tokens at list price. No caching, no batch discount.
Per million tokens. Prices and uptime via OpenRouter, checked 13 Oct 2026.
GPT-4.1 Nano is developed by OpenAI while Mercury 2.5 Preview is developed by Inception. GPT-4.1 Nano has a 1.0M token context window vs Mercury 2.5 Preview's 260K. You can compare their actual outputs across 54 challenges on Rival to see how they differ in practice.
It depends on your use case. GPT-4.1 Nano and Mercury 2.5 Preview each have strengths in different areas. Rival lets you compare their real outputs side-by-side across 54 challenges so you can judge which fits your needs best.
GPT-4.1 Nano costs $0.1/M input tokens and Mercury 2.5 Preview costs $0.04/M input tokens. Mercury 2.5 Preview is $0.06/M cheaper per input. Check their side-by-side outputs on Rival to see if the price difference is justified by quality.
This page shows a side-by-side comparison of GPT-4.1 Nano and Mercury 2.5 Preview across shared challenges. You can vote on which model produced the better output in a blind duel. Browsing and voting are free. No account is needed to look; signing in only saves your votes and likes.