O4-Mini-2025-04-16 Model Card

Model Information

Model Name: O4-Mini
Developer/Creator: OpenAI
Release Date: April 16, 2025
Version: 2025-04-16
Model Type: Text, Code, Vision, Reasoning (Multimodal)

Description

O4-Mini is OpenAI's small-scale reasoning model designed to balance performance with cost-efficiency. It features multimodal capabilities, tool integration, and strong performance in mathematics and coding tasks while maintaining faster response times and lower pricing than larger models. O4-Mini represents a significant advancement over previous mini models by supporting images, browsing, and Python execution.

Technical Specifications

Context Window and Token Capacity

• Context window: 200,000 tokens
• Maximum output: 100,000 tokens

API Pricing

Cost Input tokens $1.16 per million tokens

Output tokens $4.62 per million tokens

Cost for 1,000 tokens $0.00116 (input) + $0.00462 (output) = $0.00578

Performance Benchmarks

• MMLU: 83.2% accuracy
• AIME (mathematics): 92.7% accuracy without tools
• Codeforces: ELO 2719 (slightly above O3's 2706)
• SWE-Bench Verified: 68.1% (just behind O3's 69.1%)
• Aider Polyglot (code editing): 68.9% (whole file) / 58.2% (diff format)

Key Capabilities

Reasoning and Problem-Solving

• Uses chain-of-thought process to break down complex problems
• Excels in mathematical problem-solving (92.7% on AIME benchmark)
• Handles multi-step logical reasoning with structured thinking
• Particularly strong in STEM fields and analytical tasks

Multimodal Understanding

• Processes both text and image inputs by default
• Analyzes diagrams, charts, and whiteboard sketches
• Integrates visual information directly into reasoning chains
• Works with both high-quality and lower-quality images

Tool Integration

• Supports Python code execution, web browsing, and image processing
• Chains tools together for complex multi-step workflows
• Available in standard and "high" variants (with more time spent on responses)
• First mini model to offer full tool support out of the box

Code Generation

• Near-O3 performance on coding benchmarks
• Works across multiple programming languages
• Effective at both generating new code and editing existing code
• Strong performance in real-world software engineering tasks

Integration and Availability

References and Examples

For more detailed information, usage references, and additional examples, please refer to our comprehensive documentation at:

• API Documentation: https://docs.aimlapi.com/api-references/text-models-llm/openai/o4-mini

Limitations and Considerations

• Higher first-token latency (32.04s) due to reasoning process
• Some performance tradeoffs compared to larger O3 model
• May struggle with particularly complex creative writing tasks

Optimal Use Cases

• Mathematical problem-solving and logical reasoning
• Code generation and debugging
• Data analysis with visual components
• Cost-effective agent development
• Applications requiring balance between quality and efficiency

Comparison with Other Models

• Offers near-O3 performance at approximately 1/10th the cost
• Outperforms previous O3-Mini and O1 models across most benchmarks
• First mini model with full multimodal capabilities
• Represents middle ground between larger reasoning and smaller, faster models

Summary

O4-Mini delivers impressive reasoning capabilities with multimodal support at an accessible price point. It excels in mathematical and coding tasks while maintaining strong performance across general benchmarks, making it an excellent choice for developers seeking balanced performance and efficiency for a wide range of applications.

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