Best LLM API for Coding
Compare LLM API pricing and capabilities for coding tasks. Independently benchmarked models for code generation, debugging, and software development — with verified per-token prices.
MODELPRICEWATCH.COM · 2026-08-09
Cost calculator for this use casemonthly cost, top 3 models
- 1 Claude Opus 5
- $—
- 2 GPT-5.6 Sol
- $—
- 3 Claude Fable 5
- $—
Full ranking — top 26 models
list prices, USD per 1M tokens| Model | SWE-bench Verified | Blended* | Input | Output | Context | Provider |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1Claude Opus 5 | 97% | $10.00 | $5.00 | $25.00 | 1M | Anthropic |
| 2GPT-5.6 Sol | 96.2% | $11.25 | $5.00 | $30.00 | 1M | OpenAI |
| 3Claude Fable 5 | 95% | $20.00 | $10.00 | $50.00 | 1M | Anthropic |
| 4Kimi K3 | 93.4% | $6.00 | $3.00 | $15.00 | 1M | Moonshot |
| 5GPT-5.6 Luna | 93% | $0.450 | $0.200 | $1.20 | 1M | OpenAI |
| 6Claude Opus 4.8 | 88.6% | $10.00 | $5.00 | $25.00 | 1M | Anthropic |
| 7Claude Opus 4.7 | 87.6% | $10.00 | $5.00 | $25.00 | 1M | Anthropic |
| 8Claude Sonnet 5 | 85.2% | $4.00 | $2.00 | $10.00 | 1M | Anthropic |
| 9Claude Sonnet 4.5 | 82% | $6.00 | $3.00 | $15.00 | 200K | Anthropic |
| 10GPT-5.4 | 75% | $5.63 | $2.50 | $15.00 | 1M | OpenAI |
| 11Grok 4.3 | 65% | $1.56 | $1.25 | $2.50 | 1M | xAI |
| 12GPT-4.1 | 49% | $3.50 | $2.00 | $8.00 | 1M | OpenAI |
| 13MiniMax-M3 | 45% | $0.525 | $0.300 | $1.20 | 1M | MiniMax |
| 14Mistral Large 3 | 35% | $0.750 | $0.500 | $1.50 | 128K | Mistral |
| 15Llama 4 Scout | 28% | $0.168 | $0.110 | $0.340 | 10M | Meta |
| 16Llama 3.3 70B | 22% | $0.640 | $0.590 | $0.790 | 128K | Meta |
| 17Llama 3.1 8B | 12% | $0.058 | $0.050 | $0.080 | 128K | Meta |
| 18GPT-5.3 Codex | 85% vendor | $4.81 | $1.75 | $14.00 | 400K | OpenAI |
| 19DeepSeek V4 Pro | 80.6% vendor | $0.544 | $0.435 | $0.870 | 1M | DeepSeek |
| 20GPT-5.2 | 80% vendor | $4.81 | $1.75 | $14.00 | 400K | OpenAI |
| 21Inkling Small | — | $0.525 | $0.300 | $1.20 | 262K | Thinking Machines |
| 22Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite | — | $0.850 | $0.300 | $2.50 | 1M | |
| 23Inkling | — | $1.76 | $1.00 | $4.05 | 262K | Thinking Machines |
| 24Muse Spark 1.2 | — | $2.00 | $1.25 | $4.25 | 1M | Meta |
| 25Qwen3.8-Max | — | $3.00 | $2.00 | $6.00 | 1M | Alibaba |
| 26Gemini 3.6 Flash | — | $3.00 | $1.50 | $7.50 | 1M |
Recent price movement in this ranking
price-only deltas · logged by the daily scan2 of the top 26 coding models have re-priced since we began tracking · last checked Aug 9, 2026.
| Model | Changes | Latest move | Provider |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPT-5.6 Luna | 1 | price cut on Aug 1, 2026: $1/$6 → $0.2/$1.2 /Mtok | OpenAI |
| MiniMax-M3 | 1 | price cut on Jun 17, 2026: $0.6/$2.4 → $0.3/$1.2 /Mtok | MiniMax |
Most recently, GPT-5.6 Luna cut its price on Aug 1, 2026 — a sign pricing in this category is still moving, so re-check before committing to a long-term choice. See all recent price moves →
How models are selected
Generally-available models with a SWE-bench Verified score (resolving real GitHub issues) or a code-specialized release, ranked by independently-evaluated SWE-bench Verified. One row per model — host duplicates are collapsed. Vendor-reported scores are shown flagged and ranked below independently-scored models, never against them; models with no published score rank last, cheapest first. Prices shown are verified against official provider pages.
Prices are per million tokens (Mtok), sourced directly from — and linked to — official provider pricing pages. "Blended cost" is (3×input + 1×output) ÷ 4 — weighted toward input because real workloads read far more tokens than they generate.