Value Efficiency Tracker
Score-per-dollar analysis across 300 AI models. Find the models that deliver the most performance for every dollar spent, broken down by price tier, provider, and the sweet spot between quality and affordability.
Value Champions
Cost vs Score (Value Map)
Value Rankings
Top 50 non-free models by Value Score| # | Model | Score | Value Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Summarizescaledown | 40 | 2000.0 |
| 2 | Extractscaledown | 40 | 2000.0 |
| 3 | Ling 3.0 Tinyinclusionai | 40 | 1333.3 |
| 4 | Ling 3.0 Flashinclusionai | 40 | 952.4 |
| 5 | GPT-5 Nano (batch)OpenAI | 77 | 682.7 |
| 6 | GLM Flash Latest~z-ai | 40 | 662.8 |
| 7 | Llama 3.1 8B InstructMeta | 41 | 626.2 |
| 8 | GLM 5.3 Flash (batch)Zhipu AI | 70 | 606.1 |
| 9 | Phi 4Microsoft | 61 | 581.0 |
| 10 | Qwen3.7 FlashAlibaba | 40 | 500.0 |
| 11 | GPT-4.1 Nano (batch)OpenAI | 59 | 471.2 |
| 12 | Schematron V2 Turboinference-net | 40 | 444.4 |
| 13 | Mercury 2.5Inception | 40 | 421.1 |
| 14 | Claude Haiku 5.5 (batch)Anthropic | 58 | 386.7 |
| 15 | Ternary Bonsai 2 9Bprism-ml | 40 | 381.0 |
| 16 | Hy-MT2-1.8BTencent | 40 | 362.0 |
| 17 | GPT-5 NanoOpenAI | 77 | 341.3 |
| 18 | Ling 3.0 Flash VLinclusionai | 40 | 333.3 |
| 19 | GPT-4o-mini (batch)OpenAI | 63 | 333.3 |
| 20 | Solar Mini 4Upstage | 40 | 320.0 |
| 21 | Qwen3.5-9BAlibaba | 67 | 316.7 |
| 22 | Gemini 2.5 Flash LiteGoogle | 79 | 316.4 |
| 23 | Llama 4 ScoutMeta | 60 | 301.0 |
| 24 | Nemotron 3.5 LightningNVIDIA | 40 | 296.3 |
| 25 | Schematron V2 Smallinference-net | 40 | 285.7 |
| 26 | Ling 3.1 Flashinclusionai | 40 | 266.7 |
| 27 | GPT-6 Luna Pro (batch)OpenAI | 40 | 266.7 |
| 28 | GPT-6 Luna (batch)OpenAI | 40 | 266.7 |
| 29 | Muse Spark 1.3 Contributormeta | 40 | 266.7 |
| 30 | Muse Spark 1.2 Contributormeta | 40 | 266.7 |
| 31 | DeepSeek V3.2DeepSeek | 83 | 260.6 |
| 32 | Granite 4.2 8BIBM | 40 | 258.1 |
| 33 | GPT-5.6 Luna Pro (batch)OpenAI | 89 | 254.3 |
| 34 | GPT-5.6 Luna (batch)OpenAI | 89 | 254.3 |
| 35 | Gemma 4 31BGoogle | 76 | 253.0 |
| 36 | Claude Haiku 5.5Anthropic | 70 | 233.0 |
| 37 | DeepSeek V4 Flash Latest~deepseek | 40 | 224.3 |
| 38 | DeepSeek V4 Flash 0731DeepSeek | 40 | 224.3 |
| 39 | GPT-5.4 Nano (batch)OpenAI | 79 | 218.8 |
| 40 | Hy-MT2-30B-A3BTencent | 40 | 216.8 |
| 41 | Hy-MT2-7BTencent | 40 | 216.8 |
| 42 | GLM 5.3 FlashZhipu AI | 70 | 214.5 |
| 43 | DeepSeek V3.2 ExpDeepSeek | 72 | 211.2 |
| 44 | Nemotron 3.5 Content SafetyNVIDIA | 40 | 200.0 |
| 45 | MiMo-V2.6-FlashXiaomi | 40 | 190.5 |
| 46 | GPT-4o-miniOpenAI | 69 | 184.8 |
| 47 | DeepSeek V4.1 Flash (batch)DeepSeek | 40 | 178.6 |
| 48 | Mercury 3Inception | 40 | 177.8 |
| 49 | DeepSeek Flash Latest~deepseek | 40 | 158.1 |
| 50 | Particle-1particle-ai | 40 | 145.5 |
Free Tier Models
8 models with zero API cost| # | Model | Score |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gemma 4 31B (free)Google | 76 |
| 2 | Flint (free)recursive | 40 |
| 3 | Xing4.0 29B A4B (free)xingchen-agi | 40 |
| 4 | Nemotron 3.5 Super VL (free)NVIDIA | 40 |
| 5 | Dots3-Note Preview (free)dots-studio | 40 |
| 6 | LFM2.5-2.6B (free)Liquid AI | 40 |
| 7 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (free)NVIDIA | 40 |
| 8 | North Mini Code (free)Cohere | 40 |
Price Tier Breakdown
The Sweet Spot - High Quality, Great Price
Models in the top 20% for value score AND top 50% for composite score. The best of both worlds.
Provider Value Comparison
Top 10 providers by avg value score (min 2 models)| Provider | Models | Avg Score | Avg Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| scaledown | 2 | 40 | 2000.0 |
| inclusionai | 4 | 40 | 721.4 |
| inference-net | 2 | 40 | 365.1 |
| ~z-ai | 2 | 40 | 358.6 |
| Inception | 2 | 40 | 299.4 |
| prism-ml | 2 | 40 | 260.0 |
| Meta | 5 | 60 | 243.3 |
| Upstage | 2 | 40 | 213.3 |
| NVIDIA | 3 | 40 | 206.5 |
| Tencent | 6 | 40 | 164.8 |
The value score is computed as composite quality score divided by average cost per million tokens. A model scoring 80 at $0.50/1M tokens has a value score of 160, while a model scoring 90 at $15/1M tokens has a value score of 6. Higher values mean more quality per dollar spent. Free models are excluded from value rankings since division by zero is undefined.
Sweet Spot models sit in the top 20% for value score AND the top 50% for composite quality score. They represent the best of both worlds: genuinely high-quality models that also deliver excellent value for money. These are the models most likely to satisfy both quality requirements and budget constraints.
Budget tier models (under $1/1M tokens) typically offer the highest value scores because even moderate quality at very low cost produces a strong ratio. However, the sweet spot analysis shows that some mid-tier models deliver the best combination of absolute quality and value. The ideal choice depends on whether you prioritize raw quality or cost efficiency.