GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark vs o3

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

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark is clearly ahead on the aggregate, 87 to 70. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark's sharpest advantage is in coding, where it averages 82.3 against 49.1. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is LiveCodeBench, 80 to 40.

o3 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $10.00 input / $40.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $2.00 input / $8.00 output per 1M tokens for GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark. That is roughly 5.0x on output cost alone. GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark gives you the larger context window at 256K, compared with 200K for o3.

Quick Verdict

Pick GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark if you want the stronger benchmark profile. o3 only becomes the better choice if its workflow or ecosystem matters more than the raw scoreboard.

Agentic

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

85.6

o3

69.9

90
Terminal-Bench 2.0
71
82
BrowseComp
75
83
OSWorld-Verified
65

Coding

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

82.3

o3

49.1

91
HumanEval
78
80
SWE-bench Verified
50
80
LiveCodeBench
40
85
SWE-bench Pro
58

Multimodal & Grounded

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

88.3

o3

72.3

86
MMMU-Pro
70
91
OfficeQA Pro
75

Reasoning

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

92.7

o3

82.6

94
SimpleQA
84
92
MuSR
82
97
BBH
86
91
LongBench v2
82
92
MRCRv2
81

Knowledge

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

78.3

o3

66

97
MMLU
86
95
GPQA
87
93
SuperGPQA
85
91
OpenBookQA
83
88
MMLU-Pro
75
42
HLE
24
88
FrontierScience
77

Instruction Following

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

92

o3

85

92
IFEval
85

Multilingual

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

90.8

o3

81.1

94
MGSM
83
89
MMLU-ProX
80

Mathematics

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark

96.7

o3

87.5

98
AIME 2023
88
98
AIME 2024
90
97
AIME 2025
89
94
HMMT Feb 2023
84
96
HMMT Feb 2024
86
95
HMMT Feb 2025
85
95
BRUMO 2025
87
98
MATH-500
88

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark is ahead overall, 87 to 70. The biggest single separator in this matchup is LiveCodeBench, where the scores are 80 and 40.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 78.3 versus 66. Inside this category, HLE is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 82.3 versus 49.1. Inside this category, LiveCodeBench is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 96.7 versus 87.5. Inside this category, AIME 2023 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for reasoning, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for reasoning in this comparison, averaging 92.7 versus 82.6. Inside this category, BBH is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 85.6 versus 69.9. 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-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 88.3 versus 72.3. Inside this category, MMMU-Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 92 versus 85. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multilingual tasks, GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark or o3?

GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark has the edge for multilingual tasks in this comparison, averaging 90.8 versus 81.1. Inside this category, MGSM is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 12, 2026

Weekly LLM Benchmark Digest

Get notified when new models drop, benchmark scores change, or the leaderboard shifts. One email per week.

Free. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime. We only store derived location metadata for consent routing.