OpenAI ships Images 2.6: GPT-Image-2.6 Flare and Sunburst at the same API price, now with GIFs

OpenAI released Images 2.6 on November 4. It is in ChatGPT and Codex on every plan, and in the API as two models, GPT-Image-2.6 Flare and GPT-Image-2.6 Sunburst, at the same price as the 2.5 models they follow.

THE PRICE

OpenAI's API pricing page, read on November 5 at 00:31 UTC, lists both 2.6 models at $8 per 1M image input tokens, $30 per 1M image output tokens, $2 per 1M cached image input and $5 per 1M text input. Those are the same rates it lists for GPT-Image-2.5 Flare and Sunburst.

WHAT OPENAI SAYS

OpenAI says Images 2.6 generates images 50 percent faster than before. Flare can return an image in as little as six seconds at low quality and does better layouts for posters and product shots; Sunburst is the higher-quality tier and keeps characters and products more consistent across edits at medium or high quality. New in this release: GIF output from a single prompt, image markup in the API (it was already in ChatGPT), SVG export, and a complexity setting that controls how much planning the model does before it draws. OpenAI also says people now make 4 billion images a week across ChatGPT, Codex and the API.

WHAT WE CAUGHT

Our radar first saw a 2.6 id in a catalog it sweeps at 23:22:45 UTC and sent its alert at 23:23:45 UTC. OpenAI's API spec had named 2.6 on October 28, which @Mr_Salio spotted first.

WHAT WE DO NOT KNOW

How it scores. There are no third-party leaderboard results for 2.6 yet, and the speed and consistency claims are OpenAI's own. OpenAI has published a system card for Images 2.6, which we have not reviewed here.