Model comparison

GPT-5 Mini vs Kimi K2.6

Kimi K2.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.7 to 41.8 on the Noometry Index. GPT-5 Mini costs 2.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Kimi K2.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 39 shared benchmarks.

GPT-5 Mini OpenAI

41.8

Rank #128 Confirmed

Kimi K2.6 Moonshot AI

47.7

Rank #60 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 39 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-5 Mini scores higher in 2 categories and Kimi K2.6 in 8 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Kimi K2.6 leads 40.5 to 23.9.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is GPQA Diamond: 75% for GPT-5 Mini and 90.8% for Kimi K2.6.
  • GPT-5 Mini is cheaper at $0.25 / $2 per million input/output tokens, against $0.95 / $4 for Kimi K2.6.
  • GPT-5 Mini accepts more context: 400K tokens versus 262K.
  • Kimi K2.6 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GPT-5 Mini and Kimi K2.6 specifications
GPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
ProviderOpenAIMoonshot AI
Noometry Index41.847.7
Released2025-08-072026-04-20
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window400K262K
Max output128K262K
Input $ / M tokens$0.25$0.95
Output $ / M tokens$2$4
Results tracked6051

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Category by category

Coding Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 40.1 (#146), Kimi K2.6: 50.7 (#43)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
SWE-bench Verified64.7%76.7%
SciCode39.2%53.5%
WeirdML52.7%55.9%
LMArena Coding14061488
ALE-Bench799.771,093
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)59.8%—
LMArena WebDev—1509
SWE-bench Multilingual39.7%—
AlgoTune1.38—

Agentic & Tool Use GPT-5 Mini leads

GPT-5 Mini: 31.1 (#70), Kimi K2.6: 21.9 (#137)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
Vending-Bench 2-31.186,205
Terminal-Bench34.8%—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard55.5%—
OSWorld 2.0—4.6%
ExploitBench—18.4%
GBAEval—0.9%
GDP.pdf—12%

Reasoning Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 23.9 (#168), Kimi K2.6: 40.5 (#55)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
CritPt0%8%
Chess Puzzles30%26%
LMArena Hard Prompts13801470
Mystery Game Puzzles10%18%
DTBench80.5%90.9%
LMCA34.2%37.3%
Epoch Capabilities Index145.52151.05
ARC-AGI-24.4%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark70.3%—
NYT Connections (extended)—87.2%
ARC-AGI-154.3%—
EnigmaEval8.2%—
EBR-Bench—2.4%
ForecastBench61—

Math Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 46.7 (#69), Kimi K2.6: 57.0 (#41)

Knowledge Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 45.6 (#86), Kimi K2.6: 54.0 (#54)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
GPQA Diamond75%90.8%
SimpleQA Verified21.6%34.9%
Vectara Hallucination Rate12.9%10.8%
LMArena Expert13791491
Humanity's Last Exam19.4%—
MMLU-Pro83.5%—
Confabulations13.3%—
GPQA (HELM)75.6%—

Multimodal GPT-5 Mini leads

GPT-5 Mini: 35.6 (#85), Kimi K2.6: 31.6 (#103)

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
LMArena Vision12021283
VPCT40.2%—
Blueprint-Bench 2—3.9%
Furniture Assembly—21.7%
LMArena Document—1451

Multilingual Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 48.9 (#137), Kimi K2.6: 54.9 (#37)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
LMArena Non-English13631446
LMArena Chinese13851521
LMArena French13861471
LMArena German13661450
LMArena Japanese13411443
LMArena Korean13081427
LMArena Russian13621446
LMArena Spanish13551464

Instruction Following Too close to call

GPT-5 Mini: 76.2 (#46), Kimi K2.6: 76.3 (#43)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
LMArena Instruction Following13571451
IFEval92.7%—

Long Context Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 41.9 (#132), Kimi K2.6: 44.9 (#52)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
LMArena Longer Query13551468
Fiction.LiveBench69.4%—

Writing & Preference Kimi K2.6 leads

GPT-5 Mini: 55.2 (#148), Kimi K2.6: 68.5 (#26)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniKimi K2.6
LMArena Text13731455
LMArena Creative Writing13251434
EQ-Bench Creative Writing13131725
LMArena Multi-Turn13631453
Short-Story Creative Writing83.1%—
WildBench85.5%—
EQ-Bench 4—1202

Frequently asked questions

Is GPT-5 Mini better than Kimi K2.6?

Kimi K2.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.7 to 41.8 on the Noometry Index. GPT-5 Mini costs 2.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Kimi K2.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, GPT-5 Mini or Kimi K2.6?

GPT-5 Mini is cheaper. It lists at $0.25 per million input tokens and $2 per million output tokens; Kimi K2.6 lists at $0.95 and $4.

Is GPT-5 Mini or Kimi K2.6 better for coding?

Kimi K2.6 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 50.7 versus 40.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

GPT-5 Mini does, with 400K tokens against 262K.

How many benchmarks do GPT-5 Mini and Kimi K2.6 share?

39 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-5 Mini has 60 scored results on Noometry and Kimi K2.6 has 51.

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