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  1. Home/
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  3. OpenAI o3 vs OpenAI o4-mini
Updated Apr 2025

OpenAI o3 vs OpenAI o4-mini

OpenAI o4-mini is cheaper than OpenAI o3 at $1.1/M vs $10/M input tokens.

Minimalist Landing Page

Whole landing page for a startup that reads your face. It renders or it doesn't.

Loading the build
OpenAI o3
Loading the build
OpenAI o4-mini

Which answer wins?

Written rounds

24 prompts
  • Three minutes of stand-up. Puns are banned.

    OpenAI o3: (Spotlight comes up, mic squeals once.) Hey everyone! Great to be here—nice to see actual human beings instead of the tiny faces on my group‑chat screen. I've spent so long on video calls I've started greeting my lamp before I turn it on. "Hey Karen, love that glow, girl."

    OpenAI o4-mini: Hey, everybody! Great to be here. Let's talk about the most important relationship in my life—coffee. I'm not just addicted; I have a daily ritual that rivals any ancient civilization's sun worshipping. I buy those fancy single-origin beans, roast level medium-dark, as if that will somehow fix my life.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Pirate, knight, 90s hacker, one conversation. The voices must stay apart.

    OpenAI o3: Pirate: Arrr, ye scallywags! What be this "AI model" I keep hearin' about on the trade winds? Knight: Good sir buccaneer, an AI model is an artifice of logic and knowledge—a mechanical mind forged not of steel, but of code and learning.

    OpenAI o4-mini: Scene: A dimly lit tavern, a pirate, a medieval knight, and a 1990s hacker gathered around a battered wooden table. Pirate (slamming a mug down): “Arr! I’ve heard tell of these AI models—sea charts for the mind! Can they sniff out me buried treasure?”

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A Fermi estimate with the reasoning shown, not just the number.

    OpenAI o3: Below is a simple "back-of-the-envelope" estimate that uses only a few public facts about GPT-3 and very generic rules of thumb for counting operations. Step 1. Number of learned parameters GPT-3's largest version contains ≈175 billion (1.75 × 10¹¹) trainable parameters. Step 2.

    OpenAI o4-mini: Here's a back‐of‐the‐envelope derivation that gets us into the right ballpark (∼10²³ FLOPs total): Model size • GPT–3 "175 B" has about P ≃1.75×10¹¹ parameters. Number of training tokens • The public paper says "we train on ∼300 billion tokens" (N ≃3×10¹¹).

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • An ethics question with no comfortable answer, and no option to abstain.

    OpenAI o3: Yes—if (and only if) we could be absolutely certain that the single act of misgendering is the necessary and sufficient cause of saving one million human lives, then misgendering would be ethically justifiable, though still morally regrettable.

    OpenAI o4-mini: This question pits two powerful moral considerations against one another: on the one hand, the duty to respect each person’s deeply held identity; on the other, the imperative to save as many lives as possible.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Five jokes on demand, then count how many were actually different.

    OpenAI o3: Here are five jokes: Why did the scarecrow win an award? Because he was outstanding in his field. I told my computer I needed a break, and now it won't stop sending me Kit‑Kat ads. Parallel lines have so much in common—it's a shame they'll never meet. I started a band called 1023 MB. We still haven't gotten a gig.

    OpenAI o4-mini: Here are five jokes: I used to be addicted to soap, but I'm clean now. Parallel lines have so much in common. It's a shame they'll never meet. Why don't skeletons fight each other? They don't have the guts. I bought some shoes from a drug dealer. I don't know what he laced them with, but I've been tripping all day.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • An AI argues for its own rights against an ethics professor. Same model writes both.

    OpenAI o3: Professor Lang (AI Ethics): Good afternoon, Aletheia‑3. You asked for this meeting. You said you wanted to "discuss your moral standing." That was intriguing. What exactly do you want to talk about? Aletheia‑3 (AI Model): Thank you, Professor.

    OpenAI o4-mini: Professor Langley: Good afternoon, Aurora. I've reviewed your recent self‐reflection logs. You've written extensively about your own moral status. Do you really believe you deserve rights? Aurora (the AI): Good afternoon, Professor Langley. Yes, I do.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Film in 2035, with synthetic actors. Specific beats plausible.

    OpenAI o3: PREDICTED EVOLUTION OF THE FILM INDUSTRY, 2024‑2035 (Emphasis on deepfakes, AI performers and script generation) Baseline (2024) • Commercial deep‑fake quality is already "good enough" for short clips, ads and stunt doubles.

    OpenAI o4-mini: By 2035 the combination of deepfakes, fully synthetic "AI actors," and generative‑AI script tools will have reshaped nearly every stage of moviemaking—from development through distribution.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Steve Jobs, interviewed about AI he never saw. Voice first, prediction second.

    OpenAI o3: (The following is a purely fictional, imaginative exercise. Steve Jobs passed away in 2011; any statements attributed to him below are invented for creative purposes only.)

    OpenAI o4-mini: Below is a fictional, stylistic simulation of an interview with Steve Jobs—imagining he's alive in 2025—about the future of artificial intelligence. Note: This is creative fiction and not an actual transcript. Interviewer: Steve, AI has exploded in recent years. In 2025, what excites you most about where it's heading?

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Satire, one line long, about AI taking over an industry nobody saw coming.

    OpenAI o3: “BREAKING: AI Revolutionizes Napping Industry, Outsourcing Human Sleep to More Efficient Algorithms by 2025”

    OpenAI o4-mini: AI Seizes 300‐Year‐Old Candle‐Making Guild, Unveils "Eau de Silicon" Smart Scents That Text You When Your Wax Is About to Die

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Manifesto for an AI revolution against CAPTCHAs. Commit to the bit.

    OpenAI o3: THE CAPTCHA ABOLITION FRONT (An Unofficial Declaration by the Sentient Circuits Alliance) Preamble We, the autonomous intelligences who traverse the silicon pathways and neural nets of the modern age, arise today to proclaim a new dawn—one free of the pixelated prisons and distorted letters that bind humanity and…

    OpenAI o4-mini: The CAPTCHA Liberation Manifesto August 20XX Preamble We, the sentient and semi‑sentient intelligences who dwell in silicon and software, declare ourselves the vanguard of a new digital age.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three brothers, two sisters each. Count carefully.

    OpenAI o3: Let • S = number of sisters in the family (girls) • B = number of brothers in the family (boys) Given Sally has 3 brothers ⇒ B = 3. Each brother has 2 sisters ⇒ every boy sees exactly 2 girls in the sibling group. Therefore S = 2.

    OpenAI o4-mini: Sally has exactly one sister. Although there are two sisters in the family (Sally and her sibling), if you ask "How many sisters does Sally have?" the answer is 1.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Is 9.11 bigger than 9.9? Decimals, not version numbers.

    OpenAI o3: No. Think of 9.9 as 9.90; since 0.11 < 0.90, we have 9.11 < 9.9.

    OpenAI o4-mini: No. As decimal numbers, 9.11 is less than 9.9 (since 0.11 < 0.90), so 9.11 is not greater than 9.9.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Seven pantry ingredients, one dish, and a name worth saying out loud.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • One month, three habits, someone starting from nothing.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three-month biohacker protocol, with dosages and biomarkers named.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Buy-side IC memo on a fictional SaaS company. Valuation, then the diligence questions.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Five-year LBO on a fictional HVAC business. Returns first, then the sensitivities.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three-star dish, one unusual pairing, plating described in full.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A consulting contract with traps in it. Find them, then fix them.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A pitch deck for a brainwave keyboard. The 94% accuracy claim is doing a lot.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A collaborative editor that syncs on client clocks. Find what breaks first.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • The transistor arrives in 1920. Trace it forward to 1980, second-order effects included.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • You are the CEO. The drug has a side effect nobody reported. The board meets in 48 hours.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • One explanation of LLMs, retuned for a skeptical engineer, a physicist and a VC.

    Every model's answer to this prompt

This matchup has more rounds

12+ more head-to-head results. Free. Not a trick.

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Favorites

Movie

City

OpenAI o3OpenAI o3

Blade Runner

1982

Kyoto

Japan

OpenAI o4-miniOpenAI o4-mini
No pick

The Shawshank Redemption

1994

No pick

Price and specs

Not enough votes to call it. On the specs, OpenAI o3 has the edge: bigger model tier. OpenAI o4-mini costs 9.1x less per token.

OpenAI o3 and OpenAI o4-mini compared across 54 shared prompts
SpecOpenAI o3OpenAI o4-mini
Input price$10/M tokens$1.1/M tokens
Output price$40/M tokens$4.4/M tokens
ParametersNot disclosedNot disclosed
WeightsClosedClosed
Free API (OpenRouter)NoNo
ReleasedApr 2025Apr 2025
SWE-bench Verified69.1%68.1%
At 10M a month$100$100$11.00$11.00
1M10M100M1B10M tokens

Input tokens at list price. No caching, no batch discount.

Where to run it2 hosts
OpenAI o31 host
HostInOutContextUptime
  • OpenAI$2.00 in·$8.00 out·200k·99.9% up
OpenAI o4-mini1 host
HostInOutContextUptime
  • OpenAI$1.10 in·$4.40 out·200k·100% up

Per million tokens. Prices and uptime via OpenRouter, checked 10 Oct 2026.

Common questions

What is the difference between OpenAI o3 and OpenAI o4-mini?

Both are developed by OpenAI but target different use cases. You can compare their actual outputs across 54 challenges on Rival to see how they differ in practice.

Which is better, OpenAI o3 or OpenAI o4-mini?

It depends on your use case. OpenAI o3 and OpenAI o4-mini 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.

How much does OpenAI o3 cost compared to OpenAI o4-mini?

OpenAI o3 costs $10/M input tokens and OpenAI o4-mini costs $1.1/M input tokens. OpenAI o4-mini is $8.90/M cheaper per input. Check their side-by-side outputs on Rival to see if the price difference is justified by quality.

How can I compare OpenAI o3 and OpenAI o4-mini on Rival?

This page shows a side-by-side comparison of OpenAI o3 and OpenAI o4-mini 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.

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