GPT-5.6 Luna vs MiniMax M2.1
GPT-5.6 Luna leads MiniMax M2.1 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, 37.3 to 20.9, at about the same output price ($1.20 vs $1.20 per million). Updated October 22, 2026; 20 benchmarks have a result for both.
GPT-5.6 Luna or MiniMax M2.1: which to pick
Only GPT-5.6 Luna has a coding score, 58.0 on the Vibe Coding Index; MiniMax M2.1 has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick MiniMax M2.1 for work measured by MMLU Pro or Design Arena: 3D, where it leads.
- Shared results
- 20
- GPT-5.6 Luna only
- 100
- MiniMax M2.1 only
- 14
- Like-for-like categories
- 6 of 9
Only benchmarks that tested both models count toward a pick; a result only one model has is shown but not compared.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, six public coding benchmarks
No call
Only GPT-5.6 Luna has a coding score, so no call is made.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
GPT-5.6 Luna
GPT-5.6 Luna leads, 37.3 against 20.9.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only GPT-5.6 Luna has a AA Agentic Index result, 42.1.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
GPT-5.6 Luna
GPT-5.6 Luna leads, 91.7% against 78.5%.
Same board, both measured
Math
AIME
No call
Only MiniMax M2.1 has a AIME result, 77.9%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
MiniMax M2.1
MiniMax M2.1 leads, 87.0% against 86.0%.
Same board, both measured
Web design
Design Arena: websites
GPT-5.6 Luna
GPT-5.6 Luna leads, 1255 against 1201.
Same board, both measured
Long documents
Listed context window
GPT-5.6 Luna
GPT-5.6 Luna takes 1.05M tokens against 205K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
GPT-5.6 Luna
GPT-5.6 Luna $0.0008, MiniMax M2.1 $0.0009 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
GPT-5.6 Luna
GPT-5.6 Luna $0.04, MiniMax M2.1 $0.59.
Published attempt cost and pass rate
At a glance
- Coding index
- GPT-5.6 Luna 58.0 from 6 benchmarks, MiniMax M2.1 not benchmarked.
- Widest category
- Coding, 26.5 points apart on average over 2 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- ALE-Bench: GPT-5.6 Luna 1667.4 against MiniMax M2.1 623.8, 34.8 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Both cost $1.20 per million output tokens.
- Context window
- GPT-5.6 Luna takes 1.05M tokens, MiniMax M2.1 205K.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | GPT-5.6 Luna | Bars | MiniMax M2.1 | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 2 | 0 | ||
| Intelligence | 1 | 0 | ||
| Reasoning | 3 | 0 | ||
| Knowledge | 4 | 1 | ||
| Web design | 6 | 1 | ||
| General | 2 | 0 | ||
| All shared boards | 18 | 2 |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index20
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench coding | 73.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1518 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| AA Coding Index | 71.4 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 81.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 93.0% | 74.8% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | 11.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 77.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | 44.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | 0.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| IOI (Vals AI) | 61.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | 79.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Vibe Code Bench 1-100 (Vals AI) | 22.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| SkillsBench (Vals AI) | 60.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | 73.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 81.0% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| SciCode | 53.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 28.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| Terminal-Bench | Not measured | 36.6% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| FrontierCode | 39.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| WeirdML | 60.9% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| ALE-Bench | 1667.4 | 623.8 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1466 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1463 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1508 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1520 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena WebDev: from an image | 1517 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| SciCode | 6.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 16 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 37.3 | 20.9 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 156.5 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index16 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 42.1 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LiveBench research | 51.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LiveBench browser | 68.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LiveBench long agentic | 30.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| SREBench (Vals AI) | 1.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | 55.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | 24.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | 36.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | 67.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| BioMysteryBench (Vals AI) | 61.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Terminal-Bench-Science (Vals AI) | 0.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Vals Science Index | 25.3% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | Not measured | 85.4% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| APEX-Agents | 43.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| BALROG | 45.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | $4,095 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 26 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index30
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 91.7% | 78.5% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| LiveBench reasoning | 85.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| MysteryMechanism (Vals AI) | 14.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 85.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 91.1% | 83.0% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 39.5% | 23.2% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | 91.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| ARC-AGI | 88.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 59.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| SimpleBench | 46.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Chess puzzles | 43.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | 21.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1451 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1478 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1460 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: diagrams | 1273 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: homework | 1282 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 49.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index11 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | Not measured | 77.9% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| MATH 500 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 89.0% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | Not measured | 87.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| AA Math Index | Not measured | 82.7 | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 82.7% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | 98.3% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | 82.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | 61.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| ProofBench | 60.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1459 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1470 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 3 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index41
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 86.0% | 87.0% | MiniMax M2.1 |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 84.0% | 75.5% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| CaseLaw (Vals AI) | Not measured | 55.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 64.2% | 58.9% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 76.2% | 66.3% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 67.3% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | Not measured | 91.2% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 42.4% | 34.1% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 87.5% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | 41.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1433 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1399 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1446 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1439 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| FACTS Benchmark Suite | 35.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
Web designLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index61
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1255 | 1201 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1248 | 1220 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1195 | 1134 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1212 | 1206 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1121 | 1164 | MiniMax M2.1 |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1230 | 1190 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1193 | 1131 | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | 1142 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LiveBench design | 76.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index20
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench data analysis | 78.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | 61.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 44.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 84.4% | 80.8% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| Vals Multimodal Index | 69.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| IFBench | Not measured | 69.9% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 83.7% | 67.7% | GPT-5.6 Luna |
| DTBench | 89.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMCA | 48.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 61.9% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Furniture assembly | 42.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text | 1431 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1437 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1396 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision | 1257 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: English | 1441 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1417 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1470 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: German | 1455 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1415 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1415 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: French | 1458 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1446 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1427 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1405 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1434 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1436 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1419 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1402 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: English | 1263 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: Chinese | 1294 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: reading text | 1264 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: humor | 1190 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Vision: creative writing | 1257 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| LMArena Document | 1457 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1156 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Luna measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 12 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
GPT-5.6 Luna costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
GPT-5.6 Luna costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
GPT-5.6 Luna costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | OpenAI GPT-5.6 Luna | MiniMax M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | OpenAI | MiniMax |
| Weights | No public weights listed | Open weights |
| Released | July 9, 2026 | December 23, 2025 |
| Context window | 1.05M | 205K |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.20 | $0.30 |
| Output $/Mtok | $1.20 | $1.20 |
| Coding index | 58.0 | Not benchmarked |
| Independent measurements behind it | 6 | 1 |
| Cost per solved task | $0.04 | $0.59 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is GPT-5.6 Luna better than MiniMax M2.1 for coding?
Only GPT-5.6 Luna has a coding score, 58.0 on the Vibe Coding Index; MiniMax M2.1 has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick MiniMax M2.1 for work measured by MMLU Pro or Design Arena: 3D, where it leads.
Which is cheaper, GPT-5.6 Luna or MiniMax M2.1?
GPT-5.6 Luna costs $0.20 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; MiniMax M2.1 costs $0.30 and $1.20. Per solved SWE-bench Verified task, GPT-5.6 Luna costs $0.04 and MiniMax M2.1 $0.59.
Which has the bigger context window, GPT-5.6 Luna or MiniMax M2.1?
GPT-5.6 Luna, with 1.05M tokens against 205K.
How many benchmarks is the GPT-5.6 Luna vs MiniMax M2.1 comparison based on?
20 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 22, 2026. GPT-5.6 Luna's coding index rests on 6 independent benchmarks and MiniMax M2.1's on 1. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.