alt Hacker NewsWhat a model mess!
OpenAI now has three price points: GPT 5.1, GPT 5.2 and now GPT 5.4. There version numbers jump across different model lines with codex at 5.3, what they now call instant also at 5.3.
Anthropic are really the only ones who managed to get this under control: Three models, priced at three different levels. New models are immediately available everywhere.
Google essentially only has Preview models! The last GA is 2.5. As a developer, I can either use an outdated model or have zero insurances that the model doesn't get discontinued within weeks.
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Google is already sending notices that the 2.5 models will be deprecated soon while all the 3.x models are in preview. It really is wild and peak Google.
> What a model mess! OpenAI now has three price points: GPT 5.1, GPT 5.2 and now GPT 5.4.
I don't know, this feels unnecessarily nitpicky to me
It isn't hard to understand that 5.4 > 5.2 > 5.1. It's not hard to understand that the dash-variants have unique properties that you want to look up before selecting.
Especially for a target audience of software engineers skipping a version number is a common occurrence and never questioned.
> or have zero insurances that the model doesn't get discontinued within weeks
Why are you using the same model after a month? Every month a better model comes out. They are all accessible via the same API. You can pay per-token. This is the first time in, like, all of technology history, that a useful paid service is so interoperable between providers that switching is as easy as changing a URL.
> Google essentially only has Preview models.
It's really nice to see Google get back to its roots by launching things only to "beta" and then leaving them there for years. Gmail was "beta" for at least five years, I think.
> OpenAI now has three price points: GPT 5.1, GPT 5.2 and now GPT 5.4.
I guess that's true, but geared towards API users.
Personally, since "Pro Mode" became available, I've been on the plan that enables that, and it's one price point and I get access to everything, including enough usage for codex that someone who spends a lot of time programming, never manage to hit any usage limits although I've gotten close once to the new (temporary) Spark limits.
Wow, is that what preview means? I see those model options in github copilot (all my org allows right now) - I was under the impression that preview means a free trial or a limited # of queries. Kind of a misleading name..
They aggressively retire models, so GPT 5.1 and 5.2 are probably going to go soon.
two great problems in computing
naming things
cache invalidation
off by one errors
There is a lot of opportunity here for the AI infrastructure layer on top of tier-1 model providers
thats how they had it for years, is a mess, but controlled
> Google essentially only has Preview models! The last GA is 2.5. As a developer, I can either use an outdated model or have zero insurances that the model doesn't get discontinued within weeks.
What's funny is that there is this common meme at Google: you can either use the old, unmaintained tool that's used everywhere, or the new beta tools that doesn't quite do what you want.
Not quite the same, but it did remind me of it.