Model comparison
Grok 2 vs GPT-4o mini
- Input
- $2.00
- Output
- $10.00
- Context
- 131K
- Released
- 2024-08-20
- Input
- $0.15 per 1M tokens
- Output
- $0.60 per 1M tokens
- Context
- 128K tokens
- Released
- 2024-07-18
Grok 2 scores higher on 5 of the 5 benchmarks both models report; GPT-4o mini is cheaper on input tokens ($0.2 vs $2 per 1M, 13.3×); Grok 2 has the larger context window (131K vs 128K); Grok 2 ships open weights while GPT-4o mini is API-only.
Specs and pricing side by side
| Spec | Grok 2 | GPT-4o mini |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | xAI (Grok) | OpenAI |
| Released | 2024-08-20 | 2024-07-18 |
| Context window | 131K | 128K tokens |
| Max output | not published | 16,384 tokens |
| Input price | $2.00 | $0.15 per 1M tokens |
| Output price | $10.00 | $0.60 per 1M tokens |
| Parameters | 270B total · 115B active (mixture-of-experts) | Not disclosed by OpenAI |
| License | Grok 2 Community License Agreement (source-available) | Proprietary (OpenAI commercial terms; available via API and ChatGPT) |
| Weights | Open weights | API only |
| Modalities | Text, Vision | text input, image input (vision), text output |
| Knowledge cutoff | not published | October 2023 |
Benchmarks both models report
| Benchmark | Grok 2 | GPT-4o mini |
|---|---|---|
| MMLU | 87.5% | 82% |
| GPQA | 56% | 40.2% |
| MATH | 76.1% | 70.2% |
| HumanEval | 88.4% | 87.2% |
| MMMU | 66.1% | 59.4% |
Scores are as published by each maker or its cited source; harness, reasoning effort and date can differ between rows, so treat small gaps as ties. Sources are listed on each model page.
Which one should you pick?
Pick Grok 2 if…
- You care about MMLU, GPQA, MATH (it scores higher on 5 shared benchmarks).
- You need the longer context (131K vs 128K).
- You want to self-host or fine-tune (open weights, Grok 2 Community License Agreement (source-available)).
- You need Text / Vision input, which GPT-4o mini lacks.
- Your use case is: general-purpose chat and reasoning assistants (Grok on X).
Pick GPT-4o mini if…
- Cost matters: input tokens cost 13.3× less ($0.2 vs $2 per 1M).
- You need text input / image input (vision) / text output input, which Grok 2 lacks.
- Your use case is: high-volume text classification, tagging, and content moderation where cost per call matters.
FAQ
Which is better, Grok 2 or GPT-4o mini?
Grok 2 scores higher on 5 of the 5 benchmarks both models report; GPT-4o mini is cheaper on input tokens ($0.2 vs $2 per 1M, 13.3×); Grok 2 has the larger context window (131K vs 128K); Grok 2 ships open weights while GPT-4o mini is API-only. The better pick depends on whether you value benchmark scores, price per token, context length or openness for your workload.
How much cheaper is GPT-4o mini?
Grok 2: $2.00 input, $10.00 output. GPT-4o mini: $0.15 per 1M tokens input, $0.60 per 1M tokens output (list API prices as published by each maker).
What are the context windows of Grok 2 and GPT-4o mini?
Grok 2 offers 131K; GPT-4o mini offers 128K tokens with up to 16,384 tokens output.
Is Grok 2 newer than GPT-4o mini?
Grok 2 was released 2024-08-20; GPT-4o mini was released 2024-07-18.