Comprehensive side-by-side LLM comparison
GPT-5.1 Thinking leads with 1.8% higher average benchmark score. GPT-5.1 Thinking supports multimodal inputs. Both models have their strengths depending on your specific coding needs.
OpenAI
GPT-5 Codex, released by OpenAI in August 2025, is a coding-specialized large language model from the GPT-5 family engineered for software engineering, code generation, and agentic development workflows. It builds on GPT-5's architecture with optimizations targeting multi-file code editing, test generation, and automated debugging. GPT-5 Codex targets developers and agentic coding tools requiring a model tuned specifically for programming tasks.
OpenAI
GPT-5.1 Thinking, released by OpenAI in November 2025, is an extended reasoning variant from the GPT-5.1 family that applies chain-of-thought processing to improve accuracy on complex reasoning, mathematics, and coding tasks. It targets analytical workflows where deliberate reasoning over a problem significantly improves output quality.
3 months newer

GPT-5 Codex
OpenAI
2025-08

GPT-5.1 Thinking
OpenAI
2025-11
Average performance across 1 common benchmarks
GPT-5 Codex
GPT-5.1 Thinking
Performance comparison across key benchmark categories
GPT-5 Codex
GPT-5.1 Thinking
Available providers and their performance metrics
GPT-5 Codex
GPT-5.1 Thinking
GPT-5 Codex
GPT-5.1 Thinking