Best AI Models for Reasoning (2026)
Ranked by graduate-level reasoning benchmarks like GPQA Diamond — Google-proof science questions that resist web lookup. These models excel at multi-step thinking and hard problems.
| # | Model | Reasoning avg | Price / 1M |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | 94.3% | $4.50 |
| 2 |  Claude Opus 4.7 | 94.2% | $10.00 |
| 3 | Claude Opus 4.8 | 93.6% | $10.00 |
| 4 |  Qwen3 Max Thinking | 92.8% | $1.56 |
| 5 |  GLM 5.2 | 91.2% | $1.46 |
| 6 | Gemini 3 Flash Preview | 90.4% | $1.13 |
| 7 |  DeepSeek V4 Pro | 90.1% | $0.54 |
| 8 | Claude Sonnet 4.6 | 89.9% | $6.00 |
| 9 |  GPT-5 Pro | 88.4% | $41.25 |
| 10 | DeepSeek V4 Flash | 88.1% | $0.11 |
| 11 | Gemini 2.5 Pro | 86.4% | $3.44 |
| 12 |  Kimi K2 Thinking | 84.5% | $1.07 |
| 13 |  Llama 4 Maverick | 69.8% | $0.26 |
Based on verified public benchmarks; see methodology. Prices are blended 3:1 input:output per million tokens.
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FAQ
What is the best AI model for reasoning?
Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview leads this ranking with 94.3%. The full top 20 is in the table above, updated as new benchmark results land.
How is this ranking calculated?
Ranked by graduate-level reasoning benchmarks like GPQA Diamond — Google-proof science questions that resist web lookup. These models excel at multi-step thinking and hard problems. We only use publicly verifiable benchmark results with cited sources — no estimates. See our methodology page for the exact formula.
How often does this list change?
Pricing and model availability refresh hourly from OpenRouter; benchmark scores update whenever a lab publishes new official results. The ranking reflects the latest verified data.