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Ask HN: Is GPT-6 Astra worth the 2.5x cost increase over GPT-5.6 Sol?

A Hacker News user posting as minimaxir asked whether GPT-6 Astra justifies a 2.5x cost increase over GPT-5.6 Sol, reporting that social media comments are mixed when ironic posts are discounted, similar to the Fable-Opus transition. The poster said Astra unblocked novel projects where GPT-5.6 Sol left them stuck, but called it not a significant improvement otherwise, and noted Astra's greater efficiency may mean the cost is not actually 2.5x for their use case.

by read1 min views1 publishedSep 11, 2026

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| | | 2 points by minimaxir15 minutes ago |hide |past |favorite |discuss | | | | Comments on social media (when discounting the ironic posts) are mixed whether Astra is worth the cost increase, similar to the Fable-Opus transition. For the novel projects I'm working on, Astra did unblock me where I was stuck with GPT 5.6 Sol, which in itself gives it value for myself, but outside of that it's not a significant improvement if at all. I have noticed Astra is more efficient so for my use case it may not be 2.5x cost. |

source & further reading
news.ycombinator.com — original article Ask HN: How realistic is a modern-day era NLU Ask HN: Those running agents 24/7, what's your workflow and what are they doing? Ask HN: Would you pay to have your favorite AI agents in one app?
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