THE TICKER · HEAD-TO-HEAD · CHECKED DAILY · LAST CHANGE 2026-08-14
GPT-5 MINI VS KIMI K2.6
OpenAI vs Moonshot AI, in USD per million tokens, cross-checked daily against the public pricing dataset. Same jobs, both meters running.
Kimi K2.6 costs 2.1x more than GPT-5 Mini for the same job — a 1,000-token prompt with a 3,000-token reply runs $0.01 vs $0.0063. At 1,000 runs a day, that gap is $201.00 a month for identical traffic.
SIDE BY SIDE
| GPT-5 Mini → | Kimi K2.6 → | |
|---|---|---|
| Vendor | OpenAI | Moonshot AI |
| Input / MTok | $0.250 | $0.950 |
| Output / MTok | $2.00 | $4.00 |
| Output multiple | 8.0x | 4.2x |
| 1K prompt + 3K reply | $0.0063 | $0.01 |
SAME JOB, BOTH BILLS
| Scenario | GPT-5 Mini | Kimi K2.6 | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| A typical prompt | $0.0019 | $0.0039 | 2.1x |
| A 20-turn conversation | $0.0090 | $0.02 | 2.2x |
| Summarizing a 10-page document | $0.0084 | $0.02 | 2.4x |
| One agent run | $0.02 | $0.05 | 2.0x |
| A code review request | $0.0079 | $0.02 | 2.1x |
Output sizes use the same editorial ratios as the Burn Calculator. Estimates, not invoices — and price is not a benchmark: the cheaper model is only a bargain if it does the job.
SETTLE IT WITH YOUR OWN PROMPT
Paste a real prompt into the Burn Calculator and see what it costs on GPT-5 Mini, Kimi K2.6 and the other 19 models on the board — plus how much of it is waste either way.