GPT-5.6 Terra vs GPT-5 Nano
GPT-5.6 Terra leads GPT-5 Nano on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, 42.1 to 13.0, and GPT-5 Nano costs 30.0x less per output token ($0.40 vs $12.00 per million). Updated October 22, 2026; 72 benchmarks have a result for both.
GPT-5.6 Terra or GPT-5 Nano: which to pick
Only GPT-5.6 Terra has a coding score, 63.9 on the Vibe Coding Index; GPT-5 Nano has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick GPT-5 Nano for output tokens 30.0x cheaper ($0.40 vs $12.00 per million) and a lower cost per solved task ($0.109 against $0.42).
- Shared results
- 72
- GPT-5.6 Terra only
- 57
- GPT-5 Nano only
- 16
- Like-for-like categories
- 8 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 Terra has a coding score, so no call is made.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
GPT-5.6 Terra
GPT-5.6 Terra leads, 42.1 against 13.0.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only GPT-5.6 Terra has a AA Agentic Index result, 43.2.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
GPT-5.6 Terra
GPT-5.6 Terra leads, 90.9% against 63.4%.
Same board, both measured
Math
AIME
No call
Only GPT-5 Nano has a AIME result, 81.2%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
GPT-5.6 Terra
GPT-5.6 Terra leads, 86.7% against 76.1%.
Same board, both measured
Web design
Design Arena: websites
GPT-5.6 Terra
GPT-5.6 Terra leads, 1268 against 1101.
Same board, both measured
Long documents
Listed context window
GPT-5.6 Terra
GPT-5.6 Terra takes 1.05M tokens against 400K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
GPT-5 Nano
GPT-5.6 Terra $0.0080, GPT-5 Nano $0.0003 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
GPT-5 Nano
GPT-5.6 Terra $0.42, GPT-5 Nano $0.109.
Published attempt cost and pass rate
At a glance
- Coding index
- GPT-5.6 Terra 63.9 from 6 benchmarks, GPT-5 Nano not benchmarked.
- Widest category
- Agentic work, 49.7 points apart on average over 1 shared benchmark.
- Widest single gap
- ARC-AGI-2: GPT-5.6 Terra 83.9% against GPT-5 Nano 2.6%, 81.3 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- GPT-5.6 Terra $12.00 against GPT-5 Nano $0.40 per million output tokens, 30.0x apart.
- Context window
- GPT-5.6 Terra takes 1.05M tokens, GPT-5 Nano 400K.
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 Terra | Bars | GPT-5 Nano | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 5 | 0 | ||
| Intelligence | 2 | 0 | ||
| Agentic work | 1 | 0 | ||
| Reasoning | 14 | 1 | ||
| Math | 6 | 0 | ||
| Knowledge | 10 | 0 | ||
| Web design | 6 | 0 | ||
| General | 27 | 0 | ||
| All shared boards | 71 | 1 |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index50
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE-bench Verified | Not measured | 34.8% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| LiveBench coding | 86.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1522 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| AA Coding Index | 76.7 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 85.9% | 70.2% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 95.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | 22.7% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 74.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | 47.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | 0.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| IOI (Vals AI) | 87.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | 77.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Vibe Code Bench 1-100 (Vals AI) | 14.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| SkillsBench (Vals AI) | 58.9% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | 72.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 78.9% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| SciCode | 55.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | 62.9% | 17.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Terminal-Bench | Not measured | 21.8% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| FrontierCode | 41.3% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| WeirdML | 78.3% | 38.1% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| ALE-Bench | 1951.4 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1485 | 1351 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1482 | 1345 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1513 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1526 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena WebDev: from an image | 1541 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| SciCode | 10.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| SWE-Bench Pro V2 | 92.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 14 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index20
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 42.1 | 13.0 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 160.1 | 139.2 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
Agentic workLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 43.2 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: agents building web apps | 1120 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: agents building full-stack apps | 1061 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: agents building mobile apps | 1110 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: agents building Android apps | 1060 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: agents building games | 1083 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: HTML slides | 1047 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: PowerPoint slides | 1104 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LiveBench research | 60.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LiveBench browser | 84.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LiveBench long agentic | 48.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| SREBench (Vals AI) | 9.5% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | 54.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | 30.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | 41.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | 66.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Terminal-Bench-Science (Vals AI) | 10.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | 86.3% | 36.5% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| APEX-Agents | 58.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| BALROG | 53.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | $7,343 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) | Not measured | 51.4% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 20 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index141
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 90.9% | 63.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LiveBench reasoning | 90.6% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 86.5% | 70.9% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 92.5% | 67.6% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 42.9% | 9.5% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | 93.3% | 69.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| ARC-AGI | 96.5% | 20.7% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 83.9% | 2.6% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| SimpleBench | 48.9% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Chess puzzles | 47.0% | 22.0% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Mystery game puzzles | 35.0% | 9.0% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| VPCT | Not measured | 37.2% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1469 | 1328 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1496 | 1321 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1465 | 1338 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: diagrams | 1295 | 1141 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: homework | 1312 | 1157 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 51.3% | 62.2% | GPT-5 Nano |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
MathLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index60
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | Not measured | 81.2% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| MATH 500 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 93.8% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | Not measured | 89.3% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| AA Math Index | Not measured | 83.7 | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 83.7% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | 99.7% | 81.1% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | 86.0% | 20.0% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | 70.7% | 2.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| ProofBench | 74.0% | 12.0% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| MATH level 5 | Not measured | 95.2% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1465 | 1317 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1478 | 1326 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| MathArena | Not measured | 12.8% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 1 board here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index100
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 86.7% | 76.1% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 85.1% | 50.1% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| CaseLaw (Vals AI) | Not measured | 52.6% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 65.3% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 76.2% | 67.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 67.3% | 53.6% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | Not measured | 93.3% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 43.4% | 30.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 78.0% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | 43.2% | 11.7% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: science | 1452 | 1318 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1430 | 1335 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1461 | 1298 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1448 | 1311 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| FACTS Benchmark Suite | 52.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
Web designLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index60
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1268 | 1101 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1256 | 1064 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1229 | 1044 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1240 | 1056 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1134 | 965 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1240 | 1084 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1219 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | 1178 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LiveBench design | 76.0% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index270
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench data analysis | 79.3% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | 62.4% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 47.0% | 30.4% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 82.9% | 72.9% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Vals Multimodal Index | 65.1% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| IFBench | 71.2% | 67.6% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 83.0% | 45.0% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| DTBench | 93.3% | 62.7% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMCA | 54.9% | 7.9% | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| Fiction.LiveBench | Not measured | 44.4% | Only GPT-5 Nano measured |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 83.8% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Furniture assembly | 54.2% | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena Text | 1448 | 1320 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1456 | 1306 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1413 | 1249 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision | 1271 | 1159 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: English | 1449 | 1321 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1441 | 1313 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1514 | 1356 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: German | 1460 | 1327 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1454 | 1227 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1427 | 1269 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: French | 1466 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1451 | 1360 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1452 | 1296 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1446 | 1314 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1453 | 1311 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1454 | 1312 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1431 | 1283 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1418 | 1268 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: English | 1272 | 1170 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: Chinese | 1337 | 1176 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: reading text | 1278 | 1152 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: humor | 1236 | 1110 | GPT-5.6 Terra |
| LMArena Vision: creative writing | 1248 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| LMArena Document | 1472 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1234 | Not measured | Only GPT-5.6 Terra measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 11 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | GPT-5.6 Terra | GPT-5 Nano | 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 Nano costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
GPT-5 Nano costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
GPT-5 Nano 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 Terra | OpenAI GPT-5 Nano |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | OpenAI | OpenAI |
| Weights | No public weights listed | No public weights listed |
| Released | July 9, 2026 | August 7, 2025 |
| Context window | 1.05M | 400K |
| Input $/Mtok | $2.00 | $0.05 |
| Output $/Mtok | $12.00 | $0.40 |
| Coding index | 63.9 | Not benchmarked |
| Independent measurements behind it | 6 | 0 |
| Cost per solved task | $0.42 | $0.109 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is GPT-5.6 Terra better than GPT-5 Nano for coding?
Only GPT-5.6 Terra has a coding score, 63.9 on the Vibe Coding Index; GPT-5 Nano has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick GPT-5 Nano for output tokens 30.0x cheaper ($0.40 vs $12.00 per million) and a lower cost per solved task ($0.109 against $0.42).
Which is cheaper, GPT-5.6 Terra or GPT-5 Nano?
GPT-5.6 Terra costs $2.00 per million input tokens and $12.00 per million output tokens; GPT-5 Nano costs $0.05 and $0.40. Per solved SWE-bench Verified task, GPT-5.6 Terra costs $0.42 and GPT-5 Nano $0.109.
Which has the bigger context window, GPT-5.6 Terra or GPT-5 Nano?
GPT-5.6 Terra, with 1.05M tokens against 400K.
How many benchmarks is the GPT-5.6 Terra vs GPT-5 Nano comparison based on?
72 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 22, 2026. GPT-5.6 Terra's coding index rests on 6 independent benchmarks and GPT-5 Nano's on 0. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.