GPT-4.1 vs GPT-5.4

Pick GPT-5.4 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. GPT-4.1 only becomes the better choice if knowledge is the priority or you want the cheaper token bill.

GPT-5.4 is clearly ahead on the provisional aggregate, 88 to 60. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

GPT-5.4's sharpest advantage is in coding, where it averages 57.7 against 54.6. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is GPQA, 66.3% to 92.8%. GPT-4.1 does hit back in knowledge, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.

GPT-5.4 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $2.50 input / $15.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $2.00 input / $8.00 output per 1M tokens for GPT-4.1. GPT-5.4 is the reasoning model in the pair, while GPT-4.1 is not. That usually helps on harder chain-of-thought-heavy tests, but it can also mean more latency and more token spend in real use. GPT-5.4 gives you the larger context window at 1.05M, compared with 1M for GPT-4.1.