Head-to-head · frontier vs frontier

GPT-5.2 Vision vs o4 Pro: which model should you choose?

We compared GPT-5.2 Vision and o4 Pro on price, context window and 12 benchmarks. GPT-5.2 Vision has the stronger average benchmark score; o4 Pro is cheaper on a blended 3:1 basis.

OpenAI

GPT-5.2 Vision

GPT-5.2 Vision is a frontier model from OpenAI. It offers a 1,000,000-token context window, costs $19.03 per million input tokens and $85.72 per million output tokens, and averages 87.4 across the index's benchmark suite.

Input
$19.03 / 1M
Output
$85.72 / 1M
Context
1,000,000
Avg score
87.4
Open weights
No
Full GPT-5.2 Vision page
OpenAI

o4 Pro

o4 Pro is a frontier model from OpenAI. It offers a 1,000,000-token context window, costs $19.37 per million input tokens and $70.19 per million output tokens, and averages 87.3 across the index's benchmark suite.

Input
$19.37 / 1M
Output
$70.19 / 1M
Context
1,000,000
Avg score
87.3
Open weights
No
Full o4 Pro page

Specification comparison

SpecGPT-5.2 Visiono4 ProEdge
Input price / 1M$19.03$19.37A
Output price / 1M$85.72$70.19B
Context window1,000,0001,000,000Tie
Max output16,38416,384Tie
Average score87.487.3A
Arena Elo1484.31471.2A
Open weightsNoNoTie

Benchmark comparison

GPT-5.2 Vision wins 8, o4 Pro wins 4, and 0 benchmarks are tied. The table shows the modelled score for each model and the gap.

BenchmarkGPT-5.2 Visiono4 ProGapWinner
MMLU-Pro89.587.71.8GPT-5.2 Vision
GPQA Diamond82.182.70.6o4 Pro
SWE-bench Verified78.878.50.3GPT-5.2 Vision
HumanEval91.292.10.9o4 Pro
MATH-50092.989.83.1GPT-5.2 Vision
AIME 202585.789.94.2o4 Pro
LiveCodeBench83.481.81.6GPT-5.2 Vision
IFEval93.990.93.0GPT-5.2 Vision
TruthfulQA85.387.92.6o4 Pro
HellaSwag94.694.40.2GPT-5.2 Vision
MMMU84.484.10.3GPT-5.2 Vision
Arena Elo1484.31471.213.1GPT-5.2 Vision

Price analysis

On a blended 3:1 input-to-output basis, GPT-5.2 Vision costs about $35.70 per million tokens and o4 Pro costs about $32.08. o4 Pro is roughly 10% cheaper than GPT-5.2 Vision. At high volume, that gap compounds quickly, so price should carry real weight unless the quality difference is decisive.

Both models list a 1,000,000-token context window. That is enough for long documents, large codebases and multi-step agent traces.

Verdict

Across 12 shared benchmarks, GPT-5.2 Vision wins 8, o4 Pro wins 4, and 0 are tied. On the index average, GPT-5.2 Vision leads o4 Pro by 0.1 points (87.4 versus 87.3).

The price picture favours o4 Pro. The context picture is effectively a tie. Those two dimensions often matter more than a few benchmark points once a model is good enough for the task.

If you need a single default, start with GPT-5.2 Vision for quality-sensitive work and o4 Pro for high-volume, well-scoped tasks. Run both on a sample of your own traffic before locking in a choice.

Choose GPT-5.2 Vision if

  • You want the higher average benchmark score in this index.

Choose o4 Pro if

  • Unit cost matters and you want the cheaper blended price.

FAQ

Is GPT-5.2 Vision better than o4 Pro?

On the index average, GPT-5.2 Vision leads o4 Pro by 0.1 points (87.4 versus 87.3). The better choice depends on price, context and your task. GPT-5.2 Vision wins 8 benchmarks, o4 Pro wins 4.

Which is cheaper, GPT-5.2 Vision or o4 Pro?

o4 Pro is cheaper on a blended 3:1 basis at about $32.08 per million tokens, versus $35.70 for GPT-5.2 Vision.

Which has the larger context window?

Both models list a 1,000,000-token context window.

Are these models open weights?

GPT-5.2 Vision is proprietary; o4 Pro is proprietary.

Which should I choose for production?

If you need a single default, start with GPT-5.2 Vision for quality-sensitive work and o4 Pro for high-volume, well-scoped tasks. Run both on a sample of your own traffic before locking in a choice.

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