Model comparison

gpt-oss-120b vs Grok 4.6

Grok 4.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 56.9 to 36.3 on the Noometry Index. gpt-oss-120b costs 43× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Grok 4.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 31 shared benchmarks.

gpt-oss-120b OpenAI

36.3

Rank #217 Confirmed

Grok 4.6 xAI

56.9

Rank #21 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 31 benchmarks with published results for both. gpt-oss-120b scores higher in 0 categories and Grok 4.6 in 9 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Grok 4.6 leads 61.4 to 20.0.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is APEX-Agents: 4.4% for gpt-oss-120b and 65.3% for Grok 4.6.
  • gpt-oss-120b is cheaper at $0.037 / $0.17 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $6 for Grok 4.6.
  • Grok 4.6 accepts more context: 500K tokens versus 131K.
  • gpt-oss-120b has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

gpt-oss-120b and Grok 4.6 specifications
gpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
ProviderOpenAIxAI
Noometry Index36.356.9
Released2025-08-052026-08-12
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window131K500K
Max output41K500K
Input $ / M tokens$0.037$2
Output $ / M tokens$0.17$6
Results tracked4849

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Category by category

Coding Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 33.5 (#256), Grok 4.6: 58.5 (#16)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
SciCode36%56.5%
WeirdML48.2%67.3%
LMArena Coding13801465
ALE-Bench575.621,508
DeepSWE—67.5%
FrontierCode—48%
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)26%—
Aider Polyglot41.8%—
CursorBench—41.4%
LMArena WebDev—1617
FrontierSWE—25.3%
AlgoTune1.41—

Agentic & Tool Use Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 12.2 (#153), Grok 4.6: 39.4 (#27)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
APEX-Agents4.4%65.3%
Vending-Bench 2-21.539,047
Terminal-Bench18.7%—
GDP.pdf—17.2%
METR Time Horizons56.6%—

Reasoning Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 20.0 (#245), Grok 4.6: 61.4 (#20)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
SimpleBench22.1%75.9%
CritPt1.1%19.7%
Chess Puzzles20%40%
LMArena Hard Prompts13641447
Mystery Game Puzzles2%34%
DTBench76.3%97.3%
LMCA22.1%48.5%
Epoch Capabilities Index139.93156.44
ARC-AGI-2—67.1%
Kagi LLM Benchmark58.6%—
NYT Connections (extended)—80%
ARC-AGI-1—87.5%
EBR-Bench—30.5%
Surface Evolver Bench25%—

Math Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 52.5 (#50), Grok 4.6: 67.0 (#24)

Math benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202588.9%99.2%
LMArena Math13891423
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)—66%
FrontierMath Tier 4—31.7%
ProofBench—51%
Omni-MATH68.8%—

Knowledge Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 42.4 (#96), Grok 4.6: 63.3 (#20)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
GPQA Diamond75.8%94%
LMArena Expert13561467
SimpleQA Verified—49.3%
MMLU-Pro79.5%—
Confabulations15.7%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate14.2%—
GPQA (HELM)68.4%—

Multimodal Not comparable

gpt-oss-120b: —, Grok 4.6: 43.6 (#23)

Multimodal benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
LMArena Vision—1263
Blueprint-Bench 2—33.2%
Furniture Assembly—40%
LMArena Document—1452

Multilingual Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 48.0 (#147), Grok 4.6: 53.0 (#74)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
LMArena Non-English13511420
LMArena Chinese13851480
LMArena French13691461
LMArena German13531431
LMArena Japanese13311376
LMArena Korean12821397
LMArena Russian13431422
LMArena Spanish13891404

Instruction Following Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 69.3 (#173), Grok 4.6: 75.4 (#63)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
LMArena Instruction Following13181431
IFEval83.6%—

Long Context Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 31.4 (#278), Grok 4.6: 44.5 (#66)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
LMArena Longer Query13191454
Fiction.LiveBench44.4%—

Writing & Preference Grok 4.6 leads

gpt-oss-120b: 46.5 (#217), Grok 4.6: 62.3 (#80)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmarkgpt-oss-120bGrok 4.6
LMArena Text13651428
LMArena Creative Writing12751428
LMArena Multi-Turn13401425
Short-Story Creative Writing77.1%—
EQ-Bench Creative Writing961—
WildBench84.5%—

Frequently asked questions

Is gpt-oss-120b better than Grok 4.6?

Grok 4.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 56.9 to 36.3 on the Noometry Index. gpt-oss-120b costs 43× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Grok 4.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, gpt-oss-120b or Grok 4.6?

gpt-oss-120b is cheaper. It lists at $0.037 per million input tokens and $0.17 per million output tokens; Grok 4.6 lists at $2 and $6.

Is gpt-oss-120b or Grok 4.6 better for coding?

Grok 4.6 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 58.5 versus 33.5 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Grok 4.6 does, with 500K tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do gpt-oss-120b and Grok 4.6 share?

31 benchmarks have published results for both models. gpt-oss-120b has 48 scored results on Noometry and Grok 4.6 has 49.

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