LLM Provider Comparison Matrix

A practical reference for choosing the right provider and model.

Quick Comparison (December 2024)

Provider	Best For	Latency	Price	Context Window
OpenAI GPT-4o	General purpose, balanced	Medium	$$	128K
OpenAI GPT-4o-mini	Cost-sensitive apps	Fast	$	128K
Claude 3.5 Sonnet	Long documents, coding	Medium	$$	200K
Claude 3 Haiku	Speed-critical apps	Very Fast	$	200K
Gemini 1.5 Pro	Multimodal, long context	Medium	$$	1M
Gemini 1.5 Flash	High-volume apps	Fast	$	1M

Detailed Pricing

OpenAI

Model	Input ($/1M)	Output ($/1M)	Context	Rate Limits
GPT-4 Turbo	$10.00	$30.00	128K	Tier-based
GPT-4o	$2.50	$10.00	128K	Tier-based
GPT-4o-mini	$0.15	$0.60	128K	Tier-based
GPT-3.5 Turbo	$0.50	$1.50	16K	Tier-based
o1-preview	$15.00	$60.00	128K	Limited
o1-mini	$3.00	$12.00	128K	Limited

Rate Limit Tiers:

Tier 1: 500 RPM, 30K TPM
Tier 2: 5K RPM, 450K TPM
Tier 3: 5K RPM, 1M TPM
Tier 4: 10K RPM, 2M TPM
Tier 5: 10K RPM, 10M TPM

Anthropic

Model	Input ($/1M)	Output ($/1M)	Context	Rate Limits
Claude 3.5 Sonnet	$3.00	$15.00	200K	Tier-based
Claude 3 Opus	$15.00	$75.00	200K	Tier-based
Claude 3 Haiku	$0.25	$1.25	200K	Tier-based

Features:

Prompt caching (90% discount on cached tokens)
Extended thinking for complex reasoning
Tool use / function calling

Google

Model	Input ($/1M)	Output ($/1M)	Context	Rate Limits
Gemini 1.5 Pro	$3.50	$10.50	1M	360 RPM
Gemini 1.5 Flash	$0.075	$0.30	1M	1000 RPM
Gemini 1.0 Pro	$0.50	$1.50	32K	360 RPM

Features:

Native multimodal (images, video, audio)
1M token context window
Grounding with Google Search

Capability Matrix

Reasoning & Accuracy

Capability	GPT-4o	Claude 3.5	Gemini 1.5 Pro
Complex reasoning	⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐
Math/Logic	⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐
Code generation	⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐
Instruction following	⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐
Factual accuracy	⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐	⭐⭐⭐⭐

Features

Feature	OpenAI	Anthropic	Google
Streaming	✅	✅	✅
Function calling	✅	✅	✅
JSON mode	✅	✅	✅
Vision	✅	✅	✅
Audio	✅	❌	✅
Video	❌	❌	✅
Fine-tuning	✅	❌	✅
Batch API	✅	✅	✅
Prompt caching	✅	✅	✅

Use Case Recommendations

Cost-Optimized Stack

For applications where cost is the primary concern:

Simple queries: GPT-4o-mini or Gemini Flash
  - $0.15-0.30 per 1M tokens
  - Good enough for FAQ, classification, extraction

Complex queries: GPT-4o or Claude Haiku
  - $2.50-3.00 per 1M tokens
  - When quality matters more than cost

Reasoning tasks: o1-mini or Claude Sonnet
  - $3.00-15.00 per 1M tokens
  - For problems requiring multi-step reasoning

Latency-Optimized Stack

For applications where speed is critical:

<200ms TTFT: Claude Haiku, Gemini Flash
  - Fastest models available
  - Suitable for real-time applications

200-500ms TTFT: GPT-4o-mini, GPT-4o
  - Good balance of speed and capability
  - Use for interactive experiences

>500ms acceptable: Claude Opus, o1-preview
  - Highest capability models
  - Use for batch/async workloads

Long Context Stack

For applications with large documents:

<32K tokens: Any model works
  - Standard context window

32K-200K tokens: Claude 3.x, GPT-4 Turbo
  - Extended context capability

200K-1M tokens: Gemini 1.5
  - Only option for very long context
  - Consider document summarization instead

Provider-Specific Considerations

OpenAI

Pros:

Most widely adopted, best ecosystem
Consistent quality across models
Best documentation and tooling

Cons:

Rate limits can be restrictive
No extended context beyond 128K
Pricing creep on popular models

Anthropic

Pros:

Best safety/alignment
200K context window standard
Excellent for coding tasks

Cons:

Smaller model selection
No fine-tuning available
Fewer integrations

Google

Pros:

1M token context window
Native multimodal capabilities
Competitive pricing

Cons:

Less consistent quality
Fewer third-party integrations
Documentation gaps

Decision Framework

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│                    What's your priority?                     │
├─────────────────────┬─────────────────┬─────────────────────┤
│       COST          │     LATENCY     │      QUALITY        │
├─────────────────────┼─────────────────┼─────────────────────┤
│ GPT-4o-mini         │ Claude Haiku    │ Claude Opus         │
│ Gemini Flash        │ Gemini Flash    │ GPT-4 / o1          │
│ Claude Haiku        │ GPT-4o-mini     │ Claude 3.5 Sonnet   │
└─────────────────────┴─────────────────┴─────────────────────┘

Need long context (>128K)?  → Gemini 1.5 or Claude
Need multimodal (video)?    → Gemini 1.5
Need fine-tuning?           → OpenAI or Google
Need best safety?           → Anthropic

Cost Estimation Examples

Customer Support Bot

10K conversations/day
5 turns average
500 tokens/turn (with history)

Model	Monthly Cost
GPT-4o-mini	~$450
GPT-4o	~$3,750
Claude Haiku	~$375
Claude Sonnet	~$4,500

Document Analysis

1K documents/day
50K tokens/document average
500 token output

Model	Monthly Cost
Gemini Flash	~$125
Claude Haiku	~$400
GPT-4o	~$4,000
Claude Sonnet	~$4,800

Keeping Current

Pricing and capabilities change frequently. Resources:

Related guides: