GPT-5.2 Instant vs o3-mini

Side-by-side benchmark comparison across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, and math workflows.

GPT-5.2 Instant is clearly ahead on the aggregate, 85 to 71. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

GPT-5.2 Instant's sharpest advantage is in multilingual, where it averages 94.4 against 73. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is SWE-bench Verified, 75 to 49.3.

GPT-5.2 Instant is also the more expensive model on tokens at $1.50 input / $6.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $1.10 input / $4.40 output per 1M tokens for o3-mini. o3-mini gives you the larger context window at 200K, compared with 128K for GPT-5.2 Instant.

Quick Verdict

Pick GPT-5.2 Instant if you want the stronger benchmark profile. o3-mini only becomes the better choice if you want the cheaper token bill or you need the larger 200K context window.

Agentic

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

79.6

o3-mini

66.6

83
Terminal-Bench 2.0
67
82
BrowseComp
74
74
OSWorld-Verified
61

Coding

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

75.5

o3-mini

55.6

87
HumanEval
Coming soon
75
SWE-bench Verified
49.3
74
LiveCodeBench
Coming soon
77
SWE-bench Pro
57

Multimodal & Grounded

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

93.1

o3-mini

74.4

94
MMMU-Pro
73
92
OfficeQA Pro
76

Reasoning

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

90.9

o3-mini

81.1

95
SimpleQA
Coming soon
93
MuSR
Coming soon
96
BBH
Coming soon
89
LongBench v2
82
84
MRCRv2
80

Knowledge

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

79.8

o3-mini

70.8

98
MMLU
86.9
97
GPQA
77.2
95
SuperGPQA
Coming soon
93
OpenBookQA
Coming soon
88
MMLU-Pro
Coming soon
43
HLE
Coming soon
91
FrontierScience
66

Instruction Following

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

95

o3-mini

93.9

95
IFEval
93.9

Multilingual

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

94.4

o3-mini

73

95
MGSM
Coming soon
94
MMLU-ProX
73

Mathematics

GPT-5.2 Instant

GPT-5.2 Instant

97.2

o3-mini

87.3

99
AIME 2023
Coming soon
99
AIME 2024
87.3
98
AIME 2025
Coming soon
95
HMMT Feb 2023
Coming soon
97
HMMT Feb 2024
Coming soon
96
HMMT Feb 2025
Coming soon
96
BRUMO 2025
Coming soon
98
MATH-500
Coming soon

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant is ahead overall, 85 to 71. The biggest single separator in this matchup is SWE-bench Verified, where the scores are 75 and 49.3.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 79.8 versus 70.8. Inside this category, FrontierScience is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 75.5 versus 55.6. Inside this category, SWE-bench Verified is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 97.2 versus 87.3. Inside this category, AIME 2024 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for reasoning, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for reasoning in this comparison, averaging 90.9 versus 81.1. Inside this category, LongBench v2 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 79.6 versus 66.6. Inside this category, Terminal-Bench 2.0 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 93.1 versus 74.4. Inside this category, MMMU-Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 95 versus 93.9. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multilingual tasks, GPT-5.2 Instant or o3-mini?

GPT-5.2 Instant has the edge for multilingual tasks in this comparison, averaging 94.4 versus 73. Inside this category, MMLU-ProX is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 12, 2026

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