Vortenza - Free Online Tools and CalculatorsBrowse tools

LLM Cost Comparison Tool 2026 - GPT-4o, Claude 5, Gemini 2.5

AI Tool

All models - sorted by monthly cost

ModelCost/reqMonthly
Gemini 2.0 Flashcheapest overall
$0.000300$0.9000
GPT-4o minicheapest openai
$0.000450$1.35
Claude Haiku 4.5cheapest anthropic
$0.00280$8.40
o4-mini
$0.00330$9.90
Mistral Large
$0.00500$15.00
Gemini 2.5 Pro
$0.00625$18.75
GPT-4o
$0.00750$22.50
Claude Sonnet 5best value
$0.0105$31.50
o3best reasoning
$0.0300$90.00
Claude Fable 5
$0.0350$105.00
o1
$0.0450$135.00
Claude Opus 5most capable
$0.0525$157.50

Monthly cost = cost per request x requests per day x 30. Select rows to compare models side by side. Prices last verified August 2026 from official provider pricing pages.

Which AI model is cheapest per 1,000 words in 2026?

Gemini 2.0 Flash at $0.10 per 1 million input tokens is the cheapest major model in 2026. Processing 1,000 words (roughly 1,300 tokens) costs about $0.00013. GPT-4o mini at $0.15 per 1M is the cheapest OpenAI option. Claude Haiku 4.5 at $0.80 per 1M is the cheapest Anthropic model.

The cheapest model is not always the right choice. For tasks requiring nuanced reasoning, coding, or long-context processing, a more capable model often produces better output with fewer retries and less post-processing, which can make it cheaper in practice. Use the AI token counter to measure your exact token usage per request, then run those numbers through the comparison table above to calculate your real monthly cost. The ChatGPT vs Claude vs Gemini comparison guide covers quality differences if cost alone does not determine your choice.

GPT-4o vs Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemini 2.5 Pro: which is best value?

GPT-4o costs $2.50 input and $10.00 output per 1M tokens with a 128K context window. Claude Sonnet 5 costs $3.00 input and $15.00 output with a larger 200K context window. Gemini 2.5 Pro costs $1.25 input and $10.00 output with a 1 million token context window.

For most production workloads, GPT-4o and Claude Sonnet 5 are the closest in capability and price. Gemini 2.5 Pro offers the cheapest input price and the largest context window, making it the best choice for processing very long documents. Use the OpenAI cost calculator or Claude API pricing calculator to model exact spend at your volume. The right model depends on your output quality requirements, context length needs, and budget.

How much does $50 per month buy you on each AI model?

At $50 per month with a balanced input-output ratio, GPT-4o mini gives you roughly 125,000 requests. Gemini 2.0 Flash gives over 500,000 requests. GPT-4o gives about 14,000 requests. Claude Opus 5 gives approximately 2,000 requests. Switch to Monthly Budget mode above to see exact numbers for your token ratio.

For startups and developers building AI-powered features, the cheapest models handle most standard tasks well. Reserve the expensive models for high-stakes outputs where quality is critical and volume is low. A tiered approach, using Haiku or mini for classification and routing while using Sonnet 5 or GPT-4o for final generation, is a common cost optimization pattern.

Frequently asked questions about LLM API pricing

Which AI model is cheapest per 1,000 words in 2026?
Gemini 2.0 Flash is the cheapest major model at $0.10 per 1 million input tokens, working out to roughly $0.00013 per 1,000 words. GPT-4o mini ($0.15 per 1M) and Claude Haiku 4.5 ($0.80 per 1M) are also very affordable for high-volume tasks.
How does GPT-4o pricing compare to Claude Sonnet 5?
GPT-4o costs $2.50 per 1 million input tokens and $10.00 per 1 million output tokens. Claude Sonnet 5 costs $3.00 input and $15.00 output per 1 million tokens. GPT-4o is cheaper per token but Claude Sonnet 5 offers a larger 200K context window versus 128K.
What is the best LLM for a $50 per month API budget?
At $50 per month, GPT-4o mini gives you approximately 333 million input tokens or about 250,000 average-length requests. Claude Haiku 4.5 gives about 62.5 million input tokens at the same budget. Gemini 2.0 Flash gives over 500 million input tokens. Use the monthly budget mode above to see exact numbers.
Is Claude API cheaper than OpenAI API?
It depends on the model. Claude Haiku 4.5 at $0.80 per 1M input tokens is cheaper than GPT-4o at $2.50. Claude Sonnet 5 at $3.00 is slightly more expensive than GPT-4o. Compare based on your specific input-to-output ratio using the tool above.
How much does it cost to process 1 million words with GPT-4o?
1 million words is approximately 1.3 to 1.5 million tokens. At GPT-4o input pricing of $2.50 per 1 million tokens, processing 1 million words as input costs about $3.25 to $3.75. Output costs are 4 times higher at $10.00 per 1 million tokens.
What is the cheapest way to use the OpenAI API?
Use GPT-4o mini for simple tasks at $0.15 per 1M input tokens. Use the Batch API for non-urgent work to get 50% off all models. Compress your prompts and use prompt caching for repeated system prompts. These three strategies can reduce costs by 70 to 90%.
How does Gemini 2.5 Pro pricing compare to GPT-4o?
Gemini 2.5 Pro costs $1.25 per 1 million input tokens and $10.00 per 1 million output tokens, making input 50% cheaper than GPT-4o while output is the same price. Gemini 2.5 Pro also offers up to a 1 million token context window, far larger than GPT-4o at 128K.
What is the most expensive LLM to run in 2026?
Claude Opus 5 and OpenAI o1 are among the most expensive at $15.00 per 1M input tokens and $75.00 or $60.00 per 1M output tokens respectively. OpenAI o3 costs $10.00 input and $40.00 output per 1M tokens. These models target complex reasoning tasks where accuracy outweighs cost.
How do I estimate my monthly LLM API costs?
Multiply your average tokens per request by daily request volume and by 30. Separate input and output token counts and apply the respective rates. Add both totals. The monthly budget mode in the tool above lets you work backwards from a budget to see how many requests each model allows.
Which LLM has the best cost-to-performance ratio in 2026?
Claude Sonnet 5 and GPT-4o offer the best overall value for production workloads in 2026, balancing capability and cost. For high-volume simple tasks, GPT-4o mini and Gemini 2.0 Flash offer the best cost efficiency. For maximum capability, Claude Opus 5 and o3 lead.
What is Claude Fable 5 and what does it cost?
Claude Fable 5 is Anthropic's creative specialist model, designed for storytelling, narrative generation, roleplay, and creative writing tasks. It costs $10.00 per 1 million input tokens and $50.00 per 1 million output tokens, placing it between Sonnet 5 and Opus 5 on the price scale.

Related guides

What is an AI token?Learn how token counts work across GPT, Claude, and Gemini.OpenAI API Pricing 2026Compare model prices and estimate monthly AI API spend.