AI model comparison

Sonar Reasoning Pro vs GPT-4o (2024-11-20)

Pricing, context window, benchmarks, and features compared side by side. Or skip the guesswork and send one prompt to both.

Note: Sonar Pro pricing includes Perplexity search pricing. See [details here](https://docs.perplexity.ai/guides/pricing#detailed-pricing-breakdown-for-sonar-reasoning-pro-and-sonar-pro) Sonar Reasoning Pro is a premier reasoning model powered by DeepSeek R1 with Chain of Thought (CoT).

Input / 1M
$2
Output / 1M
$8
Context
128K

The 2024-11-20 version of GPT-4o offers a leveled-up creative writing ability with more natural, engaging, and tailored writing to improve relevance & readability.

Input / 1M
$2.50
Output / 1M
$10
Context
128K

At a glance

Quick verdict

How the two models stack up on the things people ask about most.

Lower price

perplexity logo

Sonar Reasoning Pro

1.3x cheaper for a typical chat

Higher intelligence score

perplexity logo

Sonar Reasoning Pro

11.8 vs 8.4 on Artificial Analysis

Larger context window

Tie

128K vs 128K tokens

Newer release

perplexity logo

Sonar Reasoning Pro

Released March 7, 2025

Benchmarks

Benchmark scores

Independent scores from Artificial Analysis. Higher is better.

Intelligence index

perplexity logoSonar Reasoning Pro11.8
openai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)8.4

Coding index

perplexity logoSonar Reasoning ProNot available
openai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)Not available

Agentic index

perplexity logoSonar Reasoning ProNot available
openai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)Not available

Pricing

Sonar Reasoning Pro vs GPT-4o (2024-11-20) API pricing

Per-token API rates. Cheaper option highlighted.

Metricperplexity logoSonar Reasoning Proopenai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)
Input tokensPer 1M tokens$2$2.50
Output tokensPer 1M tokens$8$10
Cached input (read)Per 1M tokensNot available$1.25
Cache writePer 1M tokensNot availableNot available
Web searchPer request$0.005Not available

What it costs in practice

Estimated cost per 1,000 requests at standard rates. Coding and long-document figures also show the cost when the input is already cached.

Chat message

2K in, 500 out

perplexity logoSonar Reasoning Pro$8
openai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)$10

Coding task

30K in, 4K out

perplexity logoSonar Reasoning Pro$92
openai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)$115$77.50 cached

Long document summary

150K in, 2K out

perplexity logoSonar Reasoning Pro$316
openai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)$395$207.50 cached

Specs

Context window and capabilities

How much each model can read, how much it can write, and what it accepts as input.

Metricperplexity logoSonar Reasoning Proopenai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)
Context window128K tokens128K tokens
Max output115K tokens16K tokens
Input typesImage, TextFile, Image, Text
Output typesTextText
Reasoning effort levelsNot availableNot available
Default reasoning effortNot availableNot available
Release dateMarch 7, 2025November 20, 2024

Features

Supported features

API features available for each model.

Metricperplexity logoSonar Reasoning Proopenai logoGPT-4o (2024-11-20)
Tool callingNot supportedSupported
Structured outputsNot supportedSupported
JSON modeNot supportedSupported
ReasoningSupportedNot supported
TemperatureSupportedSupported
Stop sequencesNot supportedSupported
Deterministic seedNot supportedSupported
Verbosity controlNot supportedNot supported

Our take

Sonar Reasoning Pro is 1.3x cheaper for a typical chat. Sonar Reasoning Pro scores higher on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index (11.8 vs 8.4). The right pick depends on your workload, so the quickest way to settle it is to send the same prompt to both and compare.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Is Sonar Reasoning Pro or GPT-4o (2024-11-20) cheaper?

Sonar Reasoning Pro is cheaper for a typical chat (2K input tokens and 500 output tokens). Sonar Reasoning Pro costs $2 per 1M input tokens and $8 per 1M output tokens, while GPT-4o (2024-11-20) costs $2.50 per 1M input tokens and $10 per 1M output tokens.

Which has a bigger context window, Sonar Reasoning Pro or GPT-4o (2024-11-20)?

Sonar Reasoning Pro supports up to 128K tokens of context, compared with 128K for GPT-4o (2024-11-20).

Is Sonar Reasoning Pro smarter than GPT-4o (2024-11-20)?

On the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, Sonar Reasoning Pro scores 11.8 and GPT-4o (2024-11-20) scores 8.4, putting Sonar Reasoning Pro ahead. Benchmarks don't capture everything, so the best test is running your own prompts through both.

Can I use Sonar Reasoning Pro and GPT-4o (2024-11-20) at the same time?

Yes. Shortcut Chat sends one prompt to multiple models at once, so you can see Sonar Reasoning Pro and GPT-4o (2024-11-20) answer side by side and keep the better response.

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Why choose? Ask both.

Send one prompt to Sonar Reasoning Pro and GPT-4o (2024-11-20) at the same time. Compare the answers side by side and keep the best one.