1stTop pick
Researched 8d agoGPT-5.5
- SWE-bench Verified
- 88.7%
- Output (from)
- $30.00 / 1M
Best LLMs for Code Generation (2026)
Last refreshed 2026-05-18. Next refresh: weekly.
Compare coding-capable models by sourced software-engineering benchmarks, context window, provider coverage, and tracked token pricing.
Top three picks
Opinionated short stack for this category — scroll for the full leaderboard, pricing, and compare links.
2ndShortlist
Researched 8d agoGPT-5.5 Pro
- SWE-bench Verified
- 88.7%
- Output (from)
- $180.00 / 1M
3rdShortlist
Researched 4d agoClaude Opus 4.7
- SWE-bench Verified
- 87.6%
- Output (from)
- $25.00 / 1M
How we rank
Coding leaders are ordered on shipped coding-agent evidence first, then classic code generation scores, with recency as the last tie-break.
- Eligibility — Chat models tied to code work with current public/self-serve availability: code specialization, tracked code-execution flags, scores on SWE-bench / HumanEval / LiveCodeBench / Aider / BigCodeBench, or known code-family slugs.
- Primary ranking — SWE-bench Verified (higher is better), then HumanEval, then SWE-bench Pro.
- Tie-breaks — Newer `release` date when benchmark scores match.
- Variant collapse — We keep one row per model family (`familySlug` + parameter tier). When headline scores tie within ±0.5 pt (±10 Elo on Chatbot Arena), we pick the canonical SKU by lowest tracked input price, then GA over preview or limited access, then newest `release`. A folded sibling within the benchmark noise band can show a "Tied within margin" chip on that score cell.
- Preview fallback — The podium prefers GA models. Preview or invite-only candidates can fill this page only when fewer than three GA coding primaries remain after the gate.
- Pricing column — Input/output prices are the lowest tracked public commercial rate cards in seed data; partner-only pricing is kept out of the default ranking.
| # | Model | Input $/1M | Output $/1M | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | GPT-5.5 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 88.7% | $5.00 | $30.00 | |
| 2 | GPT-5.5 Pro ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 88.7% | $30.00 | $180.00 | |
| 3 | Claude Opus 4.7 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 87.6% | $5.00 | $25.00 | |
| 4 | GPT-5.3-Codex ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 85% | $1.75 | $14.00 | |
| 5 | Claude Opus 4.5 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 80.9% | $5.00 | $25.00 | |
| 6 | Claude Opus 4.6 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 80.8% | $5.00 | $25.00 | |
| 7 | DeepSeek V4 Pro ReasoningTools SWE-bench Verified: 80.6% | $0.43 | $0.87 | |
| 8 | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview PreviewVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 80.6% | $2.00 | $12.00 | |
| 9 | Kimi K2.6 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 80.2% | $0.75 | $3.50 | |
| 10 | GPT-5.2 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 80% | $1.75 | $14.00 | |
| 11 | Claude Sonnet 4.6 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 79.6% | $3.00 | $15.00 | |
| 12 | DeepSeek V4 Flash ReasoningTools SWE-bench Verified: 79% | $0.14 | $0.28 | |
| 13 | Xiaomi MiMo-V2.5-Pro Tools SWE-bench Verified: 78.9% | $1.00 | $3.00 | |
| 14 | Qwen3.6-Plus VisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 78.8% | $0.33 | $1.95 | |
| 15 | Qwen3-Max VisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 78.8% | $0.78 | $3.90 | |
| 16 | GLM-5 ReasoningTools SWE-bench Verified: 77.8% | $0.60 | $2.08 | |
| 17 | Mistral Medium 3.5 ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 77.6% | $1.50 | $7.50 | |
| 18 | Muse Spark ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 77.4% | — | — | |
| 19 | Qwen3.6-27B ReasoningVisionTools SWE-bench Verified: 77.2% | $0.32 | $3.20 | |
| 20 | Grok 4.20 ReasoningTools SWE-bench Verified: 76.7% | $1.25 | $2.50 |
Honorable mentions
Next seats in this ranking. Lines below are from each model's stored description in LLMReference seed data—spot-check the model page before relying on a capability claim.
Most capable agentic coding model from OpenAI. Optimized for long-horizon, agentic coding tasks in the Codex CLI and API. Note: GPT-5.3-Codex-Spark is a distinct ChatGPT Pro research preview (not API-accessible).
85%
SWE-bench Verified
Claude Opus 4.5 available on AWS Bedrock
80.9%
SWE-bench Verified
Claude Opus 4.6 available on AWS Bedrock
80.8%
SWE-bench Verified
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