Best AI for research
Synthesizing sources, answering with citations, deep reading.
Research workloads punish hallucination harder than almost any other task. The model has to read long, contradictory sources and produce an answer that a specialist wouldn't laugh at. Long-context retention and tool-use (search, browsing) are table stakes — a model with a 128K context window that loses track of page 1 by page 100 is useless for real research.
What matters: long-context faithfulness, reasoning chain quality, and willingness to say 'I don't know' rather than confabulate. Models with retrieval-augmented architectures (like Sonar Pro) have a natural edge here, but frontier chat models with large context windows are competitive when source material is provided directly.
Our research rank weights long-context (2×), reasoning (1.5×), tool-use (1×), and multilingual (0.5×). Multilingual matters more than people expect — research sources are rarely all in English.
Full rankings
All 85 models, scored for research
| # | Model | Provider | Task score | $/in | $/out | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 | Qwen: Qwen3 235B A22B Instruct 2507 | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $0.071 | $0.100 | 262K |
| 02 | OpenAI: gpt-oss-120b | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.039 | $0.180 | 131K |
| 03 | NVIDIA: Nemotron 3 Nano 30B A3B | NNVIDIA | 5.00/5.0 | $0.050 | $0.200 | 262K |
| 04 | Xiaomi: MiMo-V2-Flash | XXiaomi | 5.00/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.300 | 262K |
| 05 | Gemma 4 26B A4B | GGoogle | 5.00/5.0 | $0.060 | $0.330 | 262K |
| 06 | GLM-4.7 Flash | ZZhipu AI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.060 | $0.400 | 203K |
| 07 | DeepSeek V3.2 | DDeepSeek | 5.00/5.0 | $0.252 | $0.378 | 131K |
| 08 | NVIDIA: Nemotron 3 Super | NNVIDIA | 5.00/5.0 | $0.090 | $0.450 | 1M |
| 09 | Grok 4.1 Fast | XXAI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.200 | $0.500 | 2M |
| 10 | Qwen: Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $0.139 | $1.00 | 262K |
| 11 | Qwen: Qwen3.6 35B A3B | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $0.150 | $1.00 | 262K |
| 12 | GLM-4.7 | ZZhipu AI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.400 | $1.75 | 203K |
| 13 | Qwen: Qwen3.5 Plus 2026-04-20 | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $0.300 | $1.80 | 1M |
| 14 | Qwen: Qwen3.6 Plus | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $0.325 | $1.95 | 1M |
| 15 | GPT-5 Mini | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.250 | $2.00 | 400K |
| 16 | Qwen: Qwen3.6 27B | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $0.300 | $2.00 | 262K |
| 17 | MiMo-V2.5 | XXiaomi | 5.00/5.0 | $0.400 | $2.00 | 1.0M |
| 18 | xAI: Grok Build 0.1 | XXAI | 5.00/5.0 | $1.00 | $2.00 | 256K |
| 19 | Grok 4.20 | XXAI | 5.00/5.0 | $1.25 | $2.50 | 2M |
| 20 | Gemini 3 Flash Preview | GGoogle | 5.00/5.0 | $0.500 | $3.00 | 1.0M |
| 21 | MiMo-V2.5-Pro | XXiaomi | 5.00/5.0 | $1.00 | $3.00 | 1.0M |
| 22 | MoonshotAI: Kimi K2.6 | MMoonshotAI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.730 | $3.49 | 262K |
| 23 | GPT-5.4 Mini | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $0.750 | $4.50 | 400K |
| 24 | o4 Mini | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $1.10 | $4.40 | 200K |
| 25 | Claude Haiku 4.5 | AAnthropic | 5.00/5.0 | $1.00 | $5.00 | 200K |
| 26 | Qwen: Qwen3.6 Max Preview | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $1.04 | $6.24 | 262K |
| 27 | Qwen 3.7 Max | QQwen | 5.00/5.0 | $2.50 | $7.50 | 1M |
| 28 | GPT-4.1 | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $2.00 | $8.00 | 1.0M |
| 29 | GPT-5 | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $1.25 | $10.00 | 400K |
| 30 | GPT-5.1 | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $1.25 | $10.00 | 400K |
| 31 | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | GGoogle | 5.00/5.0 | $2.00 | $12.00 | 1.0M |
| 32 | GPT-5.2 | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $1.75 | $14.00 | 400K |
| 33 | GPT-5.4 | OOpenAI | 5.00/5.0 | $2.50 | $15.00 | 1.1M |
| 34 | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | AAnthropic | 5.00/5.0 | $3.00 | $15.00 | 1M |
| 35 | Grok 4 | XXAI | 5.00/5.0 | $3.00 | $15.00 | 256K |
| 36 | Grok 3 | XXAI | 5.00/5.0 | $3.00 | $15.00 | 131K |
| 37 | Claude Opus 4.7 | AAnthropic | 5.00/5.0 | $5.00 | $25.00 | 1M |
| 38 | Claude Opus 4.6 | AAnthropic | 5.00/5.0 | $5.00 | $25.00 | 1M |
| 39 | DeepSeek V4 Flash | DDeepSeek | 4.67/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.200 | 1.0M |
| 40 | Gemma 4 31B | GGoogle | 4.67/5.0 | $0.120 | $0.370 | 262K |
| 41 | DeepSeek V3.1 | DDeepSeek | 4.67/5.0 | $0.210 | $0.790 | 164K |
| 42 | DeepSeek V4 Pro | DDeepSeek | 4.67/5.0 | $0.435 | $0.870 | 1.0M |
| 43 | Qwen: Qwen3.6 Flash | QQwen | 4.67/5.0 | $0.188 | $1.13 | 1M |
| 44 | GPT-5.4 Nano | OOpenAI | 4.67/5.0 | $0.200 | $1.25 | 400K |
| 45 | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite Preview | GGoogle | 4.67/5.0 | $0.250 | $1.50 | 1.0M |
| 46 | Mistral Medium 3.1 | MMistral | 4.67/5.0 | $0.400 | $2.00 | 131K |
| 47 | R1 0528 | DDeepSeek | 4.67/5.0 | $0.500 | $2.15 | 164K |
| 48 | R1 | DDeepSeek | 4.67/5.0 | $0.700 | $2.50 | 164K |
| 49 | Grok 4.3 | XXAI | 4.67/5.0 | $1.25 | $2.50 | 1M |
| 50 | Xiaomi: MiMo-V2-Pro | XXiaomi | 4.67/5.0 | $1.00 | $3.00 | 1.0M |
| 51 | Mistral Medium 3.5 | MMistral | 4.67/5.0 | $1.50 | $7.50 | 262K |
| 52 | o3 | OOpenAI | 4.67/5.0 | $2.00 | $8.00 | 200K |
| 53 | Gemini 3.5 Flash | GGoogle | 4.67/5.0 | $1.50 | $9.00 | 1.0M |
| 54 | Gemini 2.5 Pro | GGoogle | 4.67/5.0 | $1.25 | $10.00 | 1.0M |
| 55 | GPT-5.5 | OOpenAI | 4.67/5.0 | $5.00 | $30.00 | 1.1M |
| 56 | OpenAI: gpt-oss-20b | OOpenAI | 4.33/5.0 | $0.030 | $0.140 | 131K |
| 57 | Qwen: Qwen3.5-9B | QQwen | 4.33/5.0 | $0.040 | $0.150 | 262K |
| 58 | Qwen: Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 | QQwen | 4.33/5.0 | $0.090 | $0.300 | 262K |
| 59 | GPT-5 Nano | OOpenAI | 4.33/5.0 | $0.050 | $0.400 | 400K |
| 60 | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | GGoogle | 4.33/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.400 | 1.0M |
| 61 | Grok 3 Mini | XXAI | 4.33/5.0 | $0.300 | $0.500 | 131K |
| 62 | DeepSeek V3.1 Terminus | DDeepSeek | 4.33/5.0 | $0.270 | $0.950 | 164K |
| 63 | Google: Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | GGoogle | 4.33/5.0 | $0.250 | $1.50 | 1.0M |
| 64 | Mistral Large 3 2512 | MMistral | 4.33/5.0 | $0.500 | $1.50 | 262K |
| 65 | GPT-4.1 Mini | OOpenAI | 4.33/5.0 | $0.400 | $1.60 | 1.0M |
| 66 | Devstral 2 2512 | MMistral | 4.33/5.0 | $0.400 | $2.00 | 262K |
| 67 | Ministral 3 14B 2512 | MMistral | 4.00/5.0 | $0.200 | $0.200 | 262K |
| 68 | Llama 3.3 70B Instruct | MMeta | 4.00/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.320 | 131K |
| 69 | Mistral Small 4 | MMistral | 4.00/5.0 | $0.150 | $0.600 | 262K |
| 70 | Mistral Small 3.1 24B | MMistral | 4.00/5.0 | $0.351 | $0.555 | 128K |
| 71 | Codestral 2508 | MMistral | 4.00/5.0 | $0.300 | $0.900 | 256K |
| 72 | Gemini 2.5 Flash | GGoogle | 4.00/5.0 | $0.300 | $2.50 | 1.0M |
| 73 | Ministral 3 3B 2512 | MMistral | 3.67/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.100 | 131K |
| 74 | Ministral 3 8B 2512 | MMistral | 3.67/5.0 | $0.150 | $0.150 | 262K |
| 75 | Qwen: Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | QQwen | 3.67/5.0 | $0.070 | $0.270 | 160K |
| 76 | Llama 4 Scout | MMeta | 3.67/5.0 | $0.080 | $0.300 | 10M |
| 77 | GPT-4.1 Nano | OOpenAI | 3.67/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.400 | 1.0M |
| 78 | Grok Code Fast 1 | XXAI | 3.67/5.0 | $0.200 | $1.50 | 256K |
| 79 | Mistral Small 3.2 24B | MMistral | 3.33/5.0 | $0.075 | $0.200 | 128K |
| 80 | Devstral Small 1.1 | MMistral | 3.33/5.0 | $0.100 | $0.300 | 131K |
| 81 | Llama 4 Maverick | MMeta | 3.33/5.0 | $0.150 | $0.600 | 1.0M |
| 82 | Devstral Medium | MMistral | 3.33/5.0 | $0.400 | $2.00 | 131K |
| 83 | GPT-4o | OOpenAI | 3.33/5.0 | $2.50 | $10.00 | 128K |
| 84 | GPT-4o-mini | OOpenAI | 3.00/5.0 | $0.150 | $0.600 | 128K |
| 85 | Xiaomi: MiMo-V2-Omni | XXiaomi | 3.00/5.0 | $0.400 | $2.00 | 262K |
Pricing — top 5 for research
The best AI for research changes every month.
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