o4-mini
Input price$1.1
Output price$4.4
MiniMaxText
MiniMax-M3
MiniMax-M3 is MiniMax's model at $0.30 input and $1.20 output per million tokens, with a 1000K context window. On a typical 3:1 input-to-output mix that blends to roughly $0.52 per million tokens, placing it in the budget band of the 68 models tracked here — cheaper than 67% of them.
Context window1000K
Input price$0.3 / 1M
Output price$1.2 / 1M
Output speed95 tok/s
Quality score89
Data updatedUpdated Aug 2026
Price verified2026-08-06 · Official
Price noteList price $0.60 / $2.40 with a standing 50% discount; reverts to list above 512K input
By price, MiniMax-M3 ranks 22nd cheapest of 68 on input and 25th on output. Its quality score of 89 ranks 26th of 68, and on value (quality score ÷ output price) it ranks 24th of 68. Its blended rate sits 81% below the catalog average.
In real billing terms: a support chatbot handling 50,000 turns a month (2,000 input / 500 output tokens each) costs about $60 per month on MiniMax-M3, while a RAG workload of 20,000 queries (8,000 input / 800 output tokens each) runs about $67. Because output is priced 4.0× input here, long-generation tasks scale cost fastest — cap output length before you optimise anything else.
A 1000K context window holds roughly 1,333 pages of A4 text (at ~750 tokens per page), ranking 22nd of 68 here. That is enough to drop in an entire technical manual or several source files at once, which suits long-document summarization and codebase-wide analysis. Output runs at about 95 tok/s (35th fastest of 68), acceptable interactively, though long responses will feel slow.
We track 1 MiniMax models, and MiniMax-M3's blended rate sits 0% above that provider's average. If your task tolerates a little less headroom, Hunyuan HY3 (Tencent) blends about 81% cheaper at a quality score of 87, and is worth benchmarking first. Going the other way, qwen3.5 scores 91 on quality for about 79% less.
Estimated monthly cost
Monthly API spend across four common workloads, next to the cheapest model we track.
| Workload | Usage assumption | This model | Cheapest model |
|---|---|---|---|
| Support chatbot | 2,000 input / 500 output tokens per turn, 50,000 turns per month | $60 | $3.00 |
| RAG document Q&A | 8,000 input / 800 output tokens per query, 20,000 queries per month | $67 | $3.84 |
| Coding assistant | 12,000 input / 2,000 output tokens per request, 10,000 requests per month | $60 | $3.20 |
| Batch summarization | 4,000 input / 400 output tokens per item, 200,000 items per month | $336 | $19 |
Derived directly from the rates on this page. Excludes prompt caching, batch discounts and free tiers.
How it compares
The alternatives worth benchmarking alongside it, from the same dataset.
| Model | Provider | Blended /1M | Quality | Price delta |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MiniMax-M3 | MiniMax | $0.52 | 89 | — |
| Hunyuan HY3Cheaper option | Tencent | $0.10 | 87 | -81% |
| qwen3.5Higher quality | Alibaba | $0.11 | 91 | -79% |
| qwen3.5-flashBest value overall | Alibaba | $0.055 | 82 | -90% |
Best for
CodingReasoningLong ContextAffordable
Modalities
Text
Where it fits — and where it doesn't
Good fit
- Coding: writing, refactoring and debugging across multi-file project context.
- Reasoning: multi-step decomposition, planning and tasks that need rigorous inference.
- Long documents: a 1000K window ingests a full contract, paper or large codebase in one pass.
- High-volume, cost-sensitive batch work: low rates suit classification, tagging and summarization at scale.
Poor fit
- Image understanding: this model is text-only, so vision tasks need a multimodal alternative.
Frequently asked questions
How much does the MiniMax-M3 API cost?
MiniMax-M3 costs $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens. On a 3:1 input-to-output mix that blends to about $0.52 per million tokens.
What does MiniMax-M3 cost per month?
It depends on volume. Using the four worked scenarios on this page: a support chatbot runs about $60/month, RAG document Q&A about $67/month, a coding assistant about $60/month, and batch summarization about $336/month. Plug your own token counts into the cost calculator for a tailored figure.
How large is the MiniMax-M3 context window?
1000K tokens — roughly 1,333 pages of A4 text at ~750 tokens per page, ranking 22nd of the 68 models tracked here.
MiniMax-M3 or Hunyuan HY3 — which is better value?
Hunyuan HY3 blends to about $0.10 per million tokens versus $0.52 for MiniMax-M3 — roughly 81% cheaper — at a quality score of 87 against 89. If that quality gap does not show up on your task, take the cheaper one; if it does, stay with MiniMax-M3. Benchmark both on your own data before deciding.
What is MiniMax-M3 best suited for?
Tagged use cases: coding, reasoning, long-context, cheap. Coding: writing, refactoring and debugging across multi-file project context. Less suitable: Image understanding: this model is text-only, so vision tasks need a multimodal alternative.
How current is this MiniMax-M3 pricing?
Pricing here was last verified on 2026-08-06 against official documentation. llmprice.app runs a daily collection job, but providers can change rates between runs — confirm against MiniMax's official pricing page before you commit.
Estimate the real cost of this model
Bring tokens per request and monthly volume into the calculator to compare total model costs.
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Pricing, speed and quality scores change over time. Confirm official documentation before production use.