An Up-to-Date Guide to ChatGPT Models [May 2025]
ChatGPT continually introduces new models with different names, and—
- Which one should you choose?
- Which offers the best value?
It’s increasingly difficult to keep track, so I’ve summarized my findings here for reference.
Let’s start with practical choices, based on your budget.
Practical Choices Based on Budget
For Power Users ($200/month)
If you can afford $200 per month, go with GPT-o1. At this tier, you’ll receive answers with a level of accuracy that is virtually impossible for ordinary humans to match.
Note, however, that image generation and speech recognition are not supported.
For Regular Paid Users ($20/month)
If you’re a heavy ChatGPT user, you’re likely in this category (I’m a paying user as well).
GPT-4o provides both image generation and speech recognition, making it an optimal choice for everyday use.
There was a time when GPT-o1-mini was available, but it doesn’t seem to be accessible anymore.
For Free Users
You’ll be limited to GPT-3.5-turbo. This is considerably inferior to GPT-4o and, in my experience, isn’t reliable enough to be considered a true “AI partner.”
For API Usage
When using the API, pay-as-you-go billing applies, which is separate from any flat-rate subscriptions.
Input and output are measured in “tokens,” and multiplying by the token price gives you the actual cost.
You can set a monthly cap for usage—for example, if you set $5/month, you’ll be able to use the API until you hit that amount; after that, requests will return errors.
While unlimited usage is possible, it’s risky, so setting a limit is advisable.
For instance, sending a “こんにちは” (“Hello”) message to GPT-4o via the API cost me $0.001795.
At this rate, you could have 2,785 exchanges per month, so unless you’re an extremely heavy user, you’re unlikely to hit the cap.
Model Comparison by Performance
Since the API is pay-as-you-go, every response incurs a cost, as shown in the table below.
On the web version (browser), it’s essentially unlimited usage, as long as the ChatGPT server does not throttle access.
| Name | Description | Input Token Price (API) | Output Token Price (API) |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPT-o1 | OpenAI’s flagship reasoning model | $15.00 / 1M | $60.00 / 1M |
| GPT-o1-mini | Cost-effective version of o1 | $0.15 / 1M | $0.60 / 1M |
| GPT-4o | Highly accurate, multimodal (text, image, audio); excels at multilingual and complex reasoning | $0.005 / 1M | $0.015 / 1M |
| GPT-4o-mini-high | Lower cost than 4o but higher performance than mini | Not officially listed | Not officially listed |
| GPT-4o-mini | Lower-cost version of 4o | $0.00015 / 1M | $0.0006 / 1M |
| GPT-3.5-turbo | Extremely fast responses, but quality is limited | $0.0005 / 1M | $0.0015 / 1M |
Other Tips (as of May 2025)
Can I Use 4.1?
OpenAI states that “GPT-4.1” is primarily available via the API.
While you can select 4.1 from the top-left menu on the website, since image generation is possible, it’s likely that 4o is running under the hood.
What is o3?
It appears to be the model intended to replace GPT-4o as the default.
The name may change, but according to ChatGPT, “It is as fast as GPT-3.5, and more accurate than GPT-4-turbo—practically equivalent to GPT-4.5.”
What about mini and nano?
The hierarchy is:
GPT-4o > GPT-4o-mini > GPT-4o-nano
- Higher performance
- Slower speed
- Higher cost
For example, GPT-4o-mini is generally higher performing and lower cost than GPT-3.5-turbo.
| Item | GPT-3.5 Turbo | GPT-4o Mini |
|---|---|---|
| Model Generation | GPT-3.5 family | GPT-4 family (latest lightweight version) |
| Accuracy | Standard (lower than GPT-4) | Almost as accurate as GPT-4o, or slightly less |
| Reasoning Ability | Moderate to weak | High (very close to GPT-4o) |
| Multilingual Support | Good (especially English, Japanese support is adequate) | Even better (excellent in Japanese and other languages) |
| Coding Ability | Standard to weak | Comparable to GPT-4o, very high |
| Speed | Fast | Comparable (as fast as GPT-3.5) |
| Cost (API/1M tokens) | Input $0.0005 / Output $0.0015 | Input $0.00015 / Output $0.0006 |
| Max Context Length | 16K tokens | 128K tokens (very long context) |
| Image/Audio Support | ❌ None | ❌ None (text only) |
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