GPT-6 Astra
OpenAI • Free: Paid
Context: ~1.05M in / 128K out*
Multimodal: Text + image in
Frontier, high-cost. AA Coding Index 76.9 (reported).
AI Models 2026: 29 Models Compared
GPT-6, Claude 5.5, Muse Wonder, Gemini, Grok, DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM, MiniMax, Nemotron and more. Which model leads in coding, reasoning, vision and cost, and what the benchmarks do not prove. Values marked * are conflicting or approximate in sources. Re-check the primary leaderboard before you decide.
No single model leads everywhere. That is the main finding.
GPT-6 Sol
OpenAI • Free: Paid (Chat)
Context: ~1.05M / 128K out*
Multimodal: Text + image in
Balanced frontier. AA Index ~47.5-48 (max effort, reported). Shipped 7 Oct 2026 to all paid ChatGPT plans with Intelligent UI (charts, forms, diagrams in answers). API $2 / $10 per 1M, cached $0.10 (reported).
GPT-6 Luna
OpenAI • Free: Free / Go (Chat)
Context: ~1.05M / 128K out*
Multimodal: Text + image in
Cheapest frontier-adjacent. $0.10 / $0.50 per 1M in/out (reported). GPT-6 Luna for Free and Go users from 8 Oct 2026; free chat unlimited with abuse safeguards (reported).
gpt-oss 120B / 20B
OpenAI • Free: Download
Context: Not stated in sources
Multimodal: Text only
Open reasoning models. Tool use, adjustable reasoning.
Claude Opus 5.5
Anthropic • Free: Paid
Context: 1M / 128K out
Multimodal: Text + image in
AA Index ~57.6-58 (reported leader). Strongest independent coding evidence. $4 / $20.
Claude Sonnet 5.5
Anthropic • Free: Paid
Context: 1M / 128K out
Multimodal: Text + image in
AA Index ~56 (reported). Best balance of quality + cost for many tasks. $2 / $10. Prompt cache reads halved to $0.10 / 1M (Oct 2026).
Claude Haiku 5.5
Anthropic • Free: Paid / high-volume
Context: 1M / 128K out*
Multimodal: Text + image in
Released 7 Oct 2026. $0.10 / $0.50 per 1M in/out for prompts up to 100K, $0.50 / $2.50 above (Reuters). 128K max output, effort dial, about 75% cheaper than Haiku 4.5. Free tier uses older Sonnet/Haiku.
Claude Fable 5.1
Anthropic • Free: Paid plans
Context: 1M / 128K out
Multimodal: Text + image in
Safeguard-restricted version of Mythos-class. Mythos restricted access.
Gemini 3.1 Pro
Google • Free: Paid plans only
Context: 1M*
Multimodal: Text, image, audio, video
Multimodal breadth. $2 / $12 (reported).
Gemini 3.8 Flash
Google • Free: Paid plans only
Context: 1M in / 64K-65K out*
Multimodal: Multimodal
Frontier-level at Flash price. $0.75 / $3.75 promo (reported, doubles 1 Jan 2027). Removed from the free picker 9 Oct 2026; free tier now Flash-Lite only (verified from Google's own support docs).
Gemini 4 Argon
Google • Free: Paid plans only
Context: 1M shared / 65K default out
Multimodal: Text, image, video, audio
Generally available 13 Oct 2026. Intro pricing $2 / $10 per 1M in/out through 30 Nov 2026, then $4 / $20. Paid API, AI Studio, Antigravity (Ultra), Gemini app, AI Mode in Search (Pro/Ultra), Android Studio, Firebase AI Logic. Not on the free API tier. 95% cached-input discount, no Free tier, Pro plan alone does not unlock API access (15 Oct reporting). One source says the intro price doubles on 1 Dec 2026: unconfirmed. A third-party index has Argon tied with GPT-6 Astra and trailing Sonnet 5.5 and Opus 5.5 (reported, not our test). AA Index ~53 (independent).
Gemma 3 (1B-27B)
Google • Free: Free
Context: 128K (32K for 1B)
Multimodal: Text + image (4B+)
Small open multimodal. Good for research / edge.
Muse Wonder
Meta • Free: Paid (API / Muse Code)
Context: ~1M in
Multimodal: Text, image, video, audio in
Released 12 Oct 2026. Frontier agent model, Active Memory + Active Focus. Model ID muse-wonder-1.0, about 1.05M context. API $4 / $20 per 1M in/out. AA Index ~52 (reported).
Muse Wonder Full
Meta • Free: Paid (Muse Code)
Context: ~1M in
Multimodal: Text, image, video, audio in
Released 12 Oct 2026. Stronger Wonder version, behind most headline scores. Muse Code subscriptions only, no public API (reported plans: Power $50 / Maximum $200 per month). AA Index ~56 (reported). Terminal-Bench 4.0: 57% (reported).
Muse Spark 1.3
Meta • Free: Meta AI chat
Context: 1M in / up to ~943K out*
Multimodal: Text, image, audio, video
Meta flagship. Open weights promised 'soon', not shipped in sources.
Muse Glimmer 30B
Meta • Free: Download
Context: Not stated
Multimodal: Text + visual
Open 30B model from Meta.
Llama 4 Scout
Meta • Free: Download
Context: 10M
Multimodal: Text + image
Largest advertised context. Not frontier-quality leader in 2026 sources.
Llama 4 Maverick
Meta • Free: Download
Context: 1M
Multimodal: Text + image
Open multimodal. No new Llama generation shipped in sources.
Grok 4.7
xAI / SpaceXAI • Free: Via Grok / API
Context: 500K, no text-output limit*
Multimodal: Text + image
Latest Grok in sources. $2 / $6 (<200K, reported). Grok 5 not confirmed. Grok Voice 3.0 launched 14 Oct: speech-to-speech, $0.08/min unchanged, Voice 2.0 deprecated (reported).
Grok 4.6
xAI / SpaceXAI • Free: Via Grok / API
Context: 500K
Multimodal: Text + image
Predecessor to 4.7. Available in Cursor / Grok Build / API.
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash
DeepSeek • Free: Free chat / API
Context: 1M*
Multimodal: Native image input reported
Cheap + open. ~$0.15 / $0.60 off-peak (reported).
DeepSeek V4 Pro
DeepSeek • Free: Free chat
Context: 1M
Multimodal: Text; vision-exp variant reported
Open frontier-scale. Vendor SWE runs high, harness-dependent.
Mistral Large 3
Mistral • Free: Le Chat free / API
Context: 256K
Multimodal: Text + image
Open flagship from Mistral.
Mistral Large 4 (preview)
Mistral • Free: Preview API
Context: 1M docs / 524K preview limit*
Multimodal: Text + image
1.05T total / 49B active in most coverage (52B in one source - conflict).
Qwen 3.8-Max
Alibaba • Free: API
Context: 1M / 131K out
Multimodal: Text, image, video in
2.4T / 95B (reported). $2 / $6 (reported).
Kimi K3
Moonshot • Free: Download
Context: 1M
Multimodal: Text (+ multimodal in family)
2.8T / 104B active (reported). AA Index 44 (reported). Agentic / coding focus.
GLM-5.3-Flash
Z.ai / Zhipu • Free: Download / API
Context: 1M* (conflicting 300K-1.31M)
Multimodal: Native multimodal
320B / 18B active (reported). $0.15 / $0.50 (reported). Base GLM-5.3 weights staged.
MiniMax M3
MiniMax • Free: Download
Context: 1M
Multimodal: Text + image + video
428B / 23B active (reported). $0.30 / $1.20 (reported). Licence: Apache in one source, custom in another.
Nemotron 3.5 Bolt 74B
NVIDIA • Free: Download (released 15 Oct)
Context: 256K*
Multimodal: Text in (agent tools)
Released 15 Oct 2026; weights on Hugging Face the same day per multiple secondary sources (exact repo page unverified). 74B total / 9B active MoE, 256K context, 24GB with 2-bit quantization. License reported as OpenMDW-1.1; NVIDIA's full openness claim (weights, data, recipes) is not fully verified against the license text. Day-one runtimes: llama.cpp, vLLM, Ollama, Unsloth, LM Studio; plugs into Hermes and OpenClaw agents. Smaller E4B for game NPCs follows 23 Oct. RTX Spark laptops on sale today, 16 Oct, reported $2,599 to $5,999. NVIDIA speed and quality claims untested independently.
Benchmarks, Who Leads Where?
Read this first: Most headline numbers are vendor-reported or secondary-reported, not independently re-run here. Scaffold / harness alone can move SWE-bench Verified by 5-15 points. Compare same effort + same harness, or do not compare. 1-2 point gaps are noise.
| Job | Leader (reported) | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Overall / general | Claude Opus 5.5 | Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index (secondary, Oct 2026 reporting): Opus 5.5 ~58, Wonder Full ~56, Sonnet 5.5 ~56, Wonder ~52, Gemini 4 Argon & GPT-6 Astra ~53, Sol ~47.5-48. |
| Coding | Claude Opus 5.5 / Claude Code (independent); GPT-6 Astra close | GPT-6 Astra AA Coding Index 76.9. SWE-bench Verified official like-for-like (Feb 2026): Opus 4.5 76.8%. Google Argon launch charts (vendor): AutomationBench 51.3%, DeepSWE v1.1 77.9%. Devin's own FrontierCode 1.1: Argon ~60.5%, GPT-6 Sol ~60.4-60.7% (single secondary source). Vendor / Vals runs (different harness) run 93-97%, not comparable. |
| Reasoning / math | No single winner | GPQA Diamond ~92-94% clustered (198 Qs, small-n). HLE 46-61% depending on tools / effort. Do not rank on 1-2 point GPQA gaps. |
| Long context | 1M is standard | Most frontier: 1M in. Llama 4 Scout 10M is an outlier. Argon: 1M shared context, 65K default output cap (Google launch post). |
| Multimodal / vision | Google Gemini (breadth); Claude / GPT-6 close on visual reasoning | Gemini 3 Pro MMMU-Pro 81%, Video-MMMU 87.6% (Google). AA MMMU-Pro: Opus 5.5 87.7%, Sol 83.3%. |
| Speed / cost | Small / open models by far | Cheapest reported: Luna $0.10 / $0.50, Haiku 5.5 $0.10 / $0.50 (prompts up to 100K), DeepSeek V4.1 Flash ~$0.15 / $0.60 off-peak, GLM Flash $0.15 / $0.50. Top: Opus 5.5 $4 / $20, Astra $10 / $50, Fable 5.1 $10 / $50 per 1M in/out. Cost per task flips token-price rankings because output volume differs. |
Sources to re-check on publication day: LMArena, SWE-bench, Scale HLE, Artificial Analysis, Vals AI. Prices change weekly.
Free / Updated Models With Free Tiers
Free tiers exist for all major chatbots, but caps, models and ads change without notice. Verify on the provider pricing / help page.
- ChatGPT: GPT-6 Luna in Free / Go (Chat from 8 Oct 2026, reported).
- Claude: Sonnet-class + Haiku web chat, capped (~15-100 msgs / 5-hr range in different summaries).
- Gemini: Flash-Lite only since 9 Oct 2026 (verified from Google's own support docs).
- Meta AI: Muse Spark via meta.ai / WhatsApp / Instagram / Facebook, daily limit reported.
- Grok: Limited Grok on grok.com + X, unpublished limits.
- DeepSeek: V4 Flash chat, fair-use throttling at peak.
- Open weights (self-host): Gemma 3, Llama 4, Qwen 3 / 3.8, DeepSeek V4, GLM-5.3-Flash, Kimi K3, MiniMax M3, gpt-oss, Muse Glimmer. No per-use fee, but you pay compute / hosting. “Open” does not mean “free to run”, large MoEs need datacenter-class hardware.
Agentic AI in 2026
What it means: Systems that pursue a goal over multiple steps, plan, choose actions, use tools (files, APIs, browser, code execution, search), observe results, and adapt, rather than producing a single response. MCP is a widely used standard for connecting agents to tools / data.
Major tools / frameworks: Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, Cursor, Grok Build, Gemini CLI / Antigravity, Devin, Windsurf, Muse Code (coding). Manus, ChatGPT Agent mode, Claude Cowork, Grok Bot / Team Bots, Gemini Spark / Enterprise Agent Platform (general / workplace). LangGraph, CrewAI, Microsoft Agent Framework, OpenAI Agents SDK, Google ADK, Claude Agent SDK, LlamaIndex, Pydantic AI, smolagents (builders).
Can do: Write / edit / refactor code, run tests, fix failures, open PRs. Multi-step research to draft report / spreadsheet / slides. File / folder work, browser / API workflows, long-running jobs, parallel subagents.
Cannot reliably do: Long-horizon / ambiguous projects (best on 1-2 well-scoped tickets). Architecture / security by default (local fixes, hallucinated APIs, skipped validation). Irreversible / high-stakes actions without approval and audit. Novel invention. Cost / reliability vary by harness, effort and model. Open-weight agents can have safeguards removed, do not present open weights as “safe by default”.
AGI Status, Hype vs Reality
Bottom line: No lab has produced a generally accepted, independently verified demonstration that AGI has been achieved. Claims vary by definition, audience and date, and often contradict each other from the same company.
- No agreed definition. “AGI” is used to mean human-level on most professional tasks, smarter than the smartest human, Nobel-level across disciplines, or a marketing era label. Without a definition, a claim of arrival is not testable.
- What leaders have said (reported, not endorsed): Sam Altman, OpenAI “not quite yet” there (Aug 2026) while Greg Brockman wrote “Welcome to the AGI era” at GPT-6 Astra launch. Dario Amodei (Anthropic) prefers “powerful AI” over AGI. Demis Hassabis (Google DeepMind), most measured, ~50% by ~2030 in 2026 reporting. Elon Musk, shortest timelines. Yann LeCun, Fei-Fei Li, Andrew Ng, sceptical / term should be retired.
- What models actually show: Real gains in coding, long-horizon agents, math / science benchmarks and multimodal work, but still narrow, harness-dependent and error-prone. HLE top scores (~46-61% depending on setting) remain well below human expert ~90% cited in benchmark literature.
- How to write it: Say “labs disagree, definitions differ, no consensus AGI exists”, not “AGI is here” or “AGI is 10 years away” as fact. Attribute every timeline to its speaker + date.
How We Will Keep This Updated
This page is a snapshot, not a live leaderboard. Model line-ups change weekly in 2026. We will update it when a major model ships, a primary leaderboard moves, or a free tier changes, and we will keep the “* = conflicting / approximate” flags instead of hiding uncertainty.