Pairwise benchmark snapshot · Aug 16, 2026

GPT-5.6 Terra vs OpenAI: o3 Mini benchmark

Name: GPT-5.6 Terra vs OpenAI: o3 Mini AI benchmark comparison
Creator: CompareLLM
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

This page compares GPT-5.6 Terra (OpenAI) and OpenAI: o3 Mini (OpenAI) using the latest snapshots we have as of Aug 16, 2026. On preference Elo, OpenAI: o3 Mini is ahead by 12 points (1,560 vs 1,548; seed-bootstrap (Aug 1, 2026)). On SWE-bench coding, OpenAI: o3 Mini resolves 78.5% versus 70.4% (seed-bootstrap (Aug 1, 2026)). GPT-5.6 Terra streams faster (128 tok/s) while OpenAI: o3 Mini is the cheaper output token ($4.4/1M). GPT-5.6 Terra has the larger context window (1.1M tokens). Every cell below is a dated snapshot from a named public source — we do not invent missing scores, and we do not run SWE-bench ourselves.

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OpenAI

GPT-5.6 Terra

OpenAI 5.6 mid tier. Official API $2/$12 per 1M after the Jul 30 2026 price cut.

Elo 1,548$6/1M out

OpenAI

OpenAI: o3 Mini

Auto-discovered from OpenRouter (openai/o3-mini). Preview until a second source matches.

Elo 1,560$4.4/1M out

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Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

GPT-5.6 Terra (4)vsOpenAI: o3 Mini (6)

GPT-5.6 Terra: 4W (40%)Overall: OpenAI: o3 MiniOpenAI: o3 Mini: 6W (60%)

← GPT-5.6 TerraOpenAI: o3 Mini →

OpenAI: o3 Mini (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

Preference Elo, Coding proficiency, SWE-bench & LiveBench accuracy

Preference Elo

1,548vs1,560

Coding Elo

1,542vs1,585

SWE-bench

70.4%vs78.5%

LiveBench

69.1%vs72.4%

GPQA Diamond

82%vs87.2%

GPT-5.6 Terra: 0WOpenAI: o3 Mini: 5W

GPT-5.6 Terra (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

128 tok/svs92 tok/s

Time to first token

160 msvs290 ms

GPT-5.6 Terra: 2WOpenAI: o3 Mini: 0W

GPT-5.6 Terra (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$6/1Mvs$4.4/1M

Input price

$1/1Mvs$1.1/1M

Context window

1.1Mvs200k

GPT-5.6 Terra: 2WOpenAI: o3 Mini: 1W

Capability Matchup Radar

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

Each spoke is a skill. Farther from the center is better (0–100th percentile). Tap any dot to inspect details.

Tap any node to inspect

Percentile 0–100

Dimensional AdvantageOpenAI: o3 Mini 4/6

Preference Elo

OpenAI: o3 Mini

12 pts advantage

Throughput Speed

GPT-5.6 Terra

36 tok/s faster

Price Efficiency

OpenAI: o3 Mini

$1.60/1M cheaper

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

—

Elo

High is better

1,548

EloHigh is better

1,560+1%

Code Elo

High is better

1,542

Code EloHigh is better

1,585+3%

LiveBench

High is better

69.1%

LiveBenchHigh is better

72.4%+5%

SWE-bench

High is better

70.4%

SWE-benchHigh is better

78.5%+12%

GPQA

High is better

82%

GPQAHigh is better

87.2%+6%

TTFT

Low is better

+81%160 ms

TTFTLow is better

290 ms

Speed

High is better

+39%128 tok/s

SpeedHigh is better

92 tok/s

In $

Low is better

+10%$1/1M

In $Low is better

$1.1/1M

Out $

Low is better

$6/1M

Out $Low is better

$4.4/1M+36%

Context

High is better

+425%1.1M

ContextHigh is better

200k

Interactive Simulator

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Simulate monthly production API costs based on published $/1M tokens.

Save up to 16% with OpenAI: o3 Mini

Monthly Volume50M tokens/mo

Quick Presets:

Token Ratio (In vs Out)70% In / 30% Out

RAG / Search (10% out)Coding / Chat (50% out)

GPT-5.6 Terra$125.00 / mo

In: $35.00Out: $90.00

OpenAI: o3 Mini$104.50 / mo

In: $38.50Out: $66.00

Estimated Cost Delta

OpenAI: o3 Mini is estimated to save $20.50/month ($246/year).

Based on 50M tokens (30% gen)

Key Selection Recommendations

1
OpenAI: o3 Mini:Pick OpenAI: o3 Mini when repo-level coding accuracy is the constraint.
2
GPT-5.6 Terra:Pick GPT-5.6 Terra when time-to-first-token matters more than peak Elo.
3
GPT-5.6 Terra:Pick GPT-5.6 Terra for million-token RAG or long-document jobs.

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsOpenAI: o3 Mini

Higher SWE-bench (78.5%).

High-volume chatOpenAI: o3 Mini

Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIGPT-5.6 Terra

Lower TTFT (160 ms).

Long-document RAGGPT-5.6 Terra

Larger window (1.1M).

Screenshots / visionGPT-5.6 Terra

GPT-5.6 Terra is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	OpenAI: o3 Mini	Higher SWE-bench (78.5%).
High-volume chat	OpenAI: o3 Mini	Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	GPT-5.6 Terra	Lower TTFT (160 ms).
Long-document RAG	GPT-5.6 Terra	Larger window (1.1M).
Screenshots / vision	GPT-5.6 Terra	GPT-5.6 Terra is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

View all news

priceJul 30, 2026

GPT-5.6 Terra after the Jul 30 cut: $2/$12 mid-tier

Terra is OpenAI’s Sonnet-class invoice. Use it when Sol is too expensive and Luna is too small.

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LIVE

OpenAI

GPT-5.6 Terra

Elo 1,548

LiveBench69.1%

SWE-bench70.4%

Speed128 tok/s

Output cost$6/1M

OpenAI

OpenAI: o3 Mini

Elo 1,560

LiveBench72.4%

SWE-bench78.5%

Speed92 tok/s

Output cost$4.4/1M

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, GPT-5.6 Terra or OpenAI: o3 Mini?: OpenAI: o3 Mini has the higher preference Elo in our latest snapshot (1,560). “Better” still depends on coding, price, and latency — see the table.
Which is better at coding, GPT-5.6 Terra or OpenAI: o3 Mini?: OpenAI: o3 Mini leads SWE-bench at 78.5% vs 70.4%. SWE-bench is one harness, not your repo.
Which is cheaper to run in production?: OpenAI: o3 Mini output tokens are $4.4/1M versus $6/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.
Which is faster, GPT-5.6 Terra or OpenAI: o3 Mini?: GPT-5.6 Terra has the lower time-to-first-token (160 ms vs 290 ms). Tokens/sec is a separate column if you care about long completions.
Which has the larger context window?: GPT-5.6 Terra accepts 1.1M tokens versus 200k.
Can I self-host either model?: Neither model is marked open-weights here. You are comparing hosted APIs.
Are these scores from CompareLLM’s own evals?: No. V1 aggregates public leaderboards (and optional first-party latency pings). Each cell names its source and date. Read /methodology.
What does preference Elo mean on this page?: Preference Elo is a crowd vote from LMArena / Arena. People see two hidden answers and pick the one they like more. The model that wins more often gets a higher Elo. That means people preferred it — not that it passed a school test. It is not SWE-bench, not accuracy, and not a number we invent. GPT-5.6 Terra and OpenAI: o3 Mini Elo cells are dated snapshots from the named source — we do not compute Arena ourselves.

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons

All GPT-5.6 Terra matchups →|All OpenAI: o3 Mini matchups →

OpenAI: o3 Mini vs OpenAI o1-mini (previous gpt-mini)OpenAI: o3 Mini vs GPT-5 mini (next gpt-mini)GPT-4.5 Orion vs GPT-5.6 Terra GPT-5 vs OpenAI: o3 Mini GPT-5.6 Sol vs OpenAI: o3 Mini OpenAI: o1 vs GPT-5.6 Terra

GPT-5.6 Terra vs OpenAI: o3 Mini benchmark

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

GPT-5.6 Terra (4)vsOpenAI: o3 Mini (6)

GPT-5.6 Terra: 4W (40%)Overall: OpenAI: o3 MiniOpenAI: o3 Mini: 6W (60%)

← GPT-5.6 TerraOpenAI: o3 Mini →

OpenAI: o3 Mini (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

Preference Elo, Coding proficiency, SWE-bench & LiveBench accuracy

Preference Elo

1,548vs1,560

Coding Elo

1,542vs1,585

SWE-bench

70.4%vs78.5%

LiveBench

69.1%vs72.4%

GPQA Diamond

82%vs87.2%

GPT-5.6 Terra: 0WOpenAI: o3 Mini: 5W

GPT-5.6 Terra (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

128 tok/svs92 tok/s

Time to first token

160 msvs290 ms

GPT-5.6 Terra: 2WOpenAI: o3 Mini: 0W

GPT-5.6 Terra (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$6/1Mvs$4.4/1M

Input price

$1/1Mvs$1.1/1M

Context window

1.1Mvs200k

GPT-5.6 Terra: 2WOpenAI: o3 Mini: 1W

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsOpenAI: o3 Mini

Higher SWE-bench (78.5%).

High-volume chatOpenAI: o3 Mini

Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIGPT-5.6 Terra

Lower TTFT (160 ms).

Long-document RAGGPT-5.6 Terra

Larger window (1.1M).

Screenshots / visionGPT-5.6 Terra

GPT-5.6 Terra is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	OpenAI: o3 Mini	Higher SWE-bench (78.5%).
High-volume chat	OpenAI: o3 Mini	Lower output list price ($4.4/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	GPT-5.6 Terra	Lower TTFT (160 ms).
Long-document RAG	GPT-5.6 Terra	Larger window (1.1M).
Screenshots / vision	GPT-5.6 Terra	GPT-5.6 Terra is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, GPT-5.6 Terra or OpenAI: o3 Mini?

OpenAI: o3 Mini has the higher preference Elo in our latest snapshot (1,560). “Better” still depends on coding, price, and latency — see the table.

Which is better at coding, GPT-5.6 Terra or OpenAI: o3 Mini?

OpenAI: o3 Mini leads SWE-bench at 78.5% vs 70.4%. SWE-bench is one harness, not your repo.

Which is cheaper to run in production?

OpenAI: o3 Mini output tokens are $4.4/1M versus $6/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.

Which is faster, GPT-5.6 Terra or OpenAI: o3 Mini?

GPT-5.6 Terra has the lower time-to-first-token (160 ms vs 290 ms). Tokens/sec is a separate column if you care about long completions.

Which has the larger context window?

GPT-5.6 Terra accepts 1.1M tokens versus 200k.

Can I self-host either model?

Neither model is marked open-weights here. You are comparing hosted APIs.

Are these scores from CompareLLM’s own evals?

No. V1 aggregates public leaderboards (and optional first-party latency pings). Each cell names its source and date. Read /methodology.

What does preference Elo mean on this page?

Preference Elo is a crowd vote from LMArena / Arena. People see two hidden answers and pick the one they like more. The model that wins more often gets a higher Elo. That means people preferred it — not that it passed a school test. It is not SWE-bench, not accuracy, and not a number we invent. GPT-5.6 Terra and OpenAI: o3 Mini Elo cells are dated snapshots from the named source — we do not compute Arena ourselves.

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Interactive Comparison Diagram

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Intelligence & Reasoning

Speed & Latency

Pricing & Capacity

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

OpenAI: o3 Mini

GPT-5.6 Terra

OpenAI: o3 Mini

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

GPT-5.6 Terra after the Jul 30 cut: $2/$12 mid-tier

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GPT-5.6 Terra

OpenAI: o3 Mini

Frequently Asked Questions

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Interactive Comparison Diagram

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Intelligence & Reasoning

Speed & Latency

Pricing & Capacity

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

OpenAI: o3 Mini

GPT-5.6 Terra

OpenAI: o3 Mini

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

GPT-5.6 Terra after the Jul 30 cut: $2/$12 mid-tier

Cast Your Matchup Vote

Community Discussions (0)

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GPT-5.6 Terra

OpenAI: o3 Mini

Frequently Asked Questions

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