SAN FRANCISCO: Open AI has launched GPT-4.1, a new suite of AI models fine-tuned for software development and engineering tasks. The lineup includes GPT-4.1, GPT-4.1 mini, and GPT-4.1 nano, now available via Open AI’s API — though not yet integrated into Chat GPT.
These models are built to follow complex instructions, generate clean code, and handle sophisticated workflows — part of OpenAI’s long-term vision of developing a fully autonomous “agentic software engineer.”
Key Features and Capabilities
- Massive 1-million-token context window, allowing the models to process up to 750,000 words — enough to analyze full codebases or extensive documentation.
- Enhanced performance in:
- Frontend development
- Formatting and consistency
- Tool usage reliability
- Minimizing unnecessary edits
“Developers can now build agents far better suited to real-world software engineering,” OpenAI said in a statement.
Benchmark Performance
- GPT-4.1 outperforms previous versions (GPT-4o and 4o mini) in coding benchmarks like SWE-bench, with accuracy ranging from 52% to 54.6%.
- Mini and Nano versions trade off some accuracy for speed and cost-efficiency:
- GPT-4.1: $2/million input tokens, $8/million output
- Mini: $0.40/million input, $1.60/million output
- Nano: $0.10/million input, $0.40/million output — OpenAI’s fastest and most affordable model yet
In comparison:
- Google Gemini 2.5 Pro: 63.8% SWE-bench accuracy
- Claude 3.7 Sonnet: 62.3%
GPT-4.1 also leads in video understanding, scoring 72% on long, subtitle-free videos in the Video-MME benchmark.
Limitations and Challenges
OpenAI acknowledges that GPT-4.1 still has limitations:
- May introduce or miss bugs during coding
- Accuracy drops significantly on very long inputs (from 84% at 8,000 tokens to 50% at 1 million)
- Can be overly literal, requiring more explicit prompts compared to GPT-4o
Still, GPT-4.1 marks a significant milestone in the push toward AI-powered software agents capable of handling everything from coding and debugging to documentation and testing.
As competition heats up with models from Google, Anthropic, and DeepSeek, OpenAI’s GPT-4.1 release signals continued momentum in the race to redefine how software is built.
