Microsoft Azure: Models Intelligence, Performance & Price

Microsoft Azure
Microsoft Azure

This analysis is intended to support you in choosing the best model provided by Microsoft Azure for your use-case.

Most Intelligent

#1
Claude Fable 5 (with fallback)
Claude Fable 5 (with fallback)
62
#2
Claude Sonnet 5 (max)
Claude Sonnet 5 (max)
55
#3
Claude Opus 4.7 (max)
Claude Opus 4.7 (max)
55
#4
GPT-5.4 (xhigh)
GPT-5.4 (xhigh)
53
#5
Claude Sonnet 4.6 (max)
Claude Sonnet 4.6 (max)
48

Intelligence index

Total 71 models

Fastest

#1
Llama 4 Maverick (FP8)
Llama 4 Maverick (FP8)
538 t/s
#2
gpt-oss-120b (low)
gpt-oss-120b (low)
342 t/s
#3
gpt-oss-120b (high)
gpt-oss-120b (high)
329 t/s
#4
Kimi K2.6
Kimi K2.6
263 t/s
#5
GPT-4.1 nano
GPT-4.1 nano
240 t/s

Output speed

Total 71 models

Lowest Price

#1
GPT-5 nano (high)
GPT-5 nano (high)
$0.05
#2
GPT-5 nano (medium)
GPT-5 nano (medium)
$0.05
#3
GPT-4.1 nano
GPT-4.1 nano
$0.08
#4
GPT-4o mini
GPT-4o mini
$0.14
#5
Phi-4
Phi-4
$0.16

Blended price (per 1M tokens)

Total 71 models

Indicates a reasoning model

Azure offers 71 models, each with different intelligence, performance, and pricing characteristics. Below is a comparison of the key metrics across models.

  • For intelligence, the top models on Azure are Claude Fable 5 (with fallback) (62), Claude Sonnet 5 (max) (55), and Claude Opus 4.7 (max) (55).
  • For output speed, the fastest models are Llama 4 Maverick (FP8) (538 t/s), gpt-oss-120b (low) (342 t/s), and gpt-oss-120b (high) (329 t/s). Speed varies significantly across models, with a 124% difference between the fastest and slowest.
  • For latency, Phi-4 Multimodal (0.82s), Llama 4 Scout (0.82s), and Phi-4 Mini (0.83s) offer the lowest time to first answer token.
  • For pricing, GPT-5 nano (high) ($0.05), GPT-5 nano (medium) ($0.05), and GPT-4.1 nano ($0.08) offer the lowest blended prices per 1M tokens. Prices vary up to 3.0x across models.
  • For context window size, GPT-5.4 (xhigh) (1M), Claude Fable 5 (with fallback) (1M), and Claude Sonnet 5 (max) (1M) support the largest context windows on Azure.

Highlights

Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index · Higher is better
Output tokens per second · Higher is better
USD per 1M tokens (blended) · Lower is better

Intelligence Evaluations

Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index

Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index v4.1.1 incorporates 9 evaluations: GDPval-AA v2, 𝜏³-Banking, Terminal-Bench v2.1, SciCode, Humanity's Last Exam, GPQA Diamond, CritPt, AA-Omniscience, AA-LCR
Estimate (independent evaluation forthcoming)
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index v4.1.1 includes: GDPval-AA v2, 𝜏³-Banking, Terminal-Bench v2.1, SciCode, Humanity's Last Exam, GPQA Diamond, CritPt, AA-Omniscience, AA-LCR. See Intelligence Index methodology for further details, including a breakdown of each evaluation and how we run them.

Intelligence Evaluations

Intelligence evaluations measured independently by Artificial Analysis · Higher is better
See more

Agentic real-world work tasks, (Elo-500)/2000

Agentic tool use

Agentic coding & terminal use

Coding

Reasoning & knowledge

Scientific reasoning

Physics reasoning

Knowledge

1 - hallucination rate

AA-LCRUpdated

Long context reasoning

Agentic knowledge work, Elo

Agentic SaaS workflows

Legal agentic work, criterion pass rate

Agentic business operations

Quantitative analysis on spreadsheets & documents

Instruction following

Long-horizon agentic tasks

Kubernetes incident root-cause analysis

Visual reasoning

Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

While model intelligence generally translates across use cases, specific evaluations may be more relevant for certain use cases.

Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index v4.1.1 includes: GDPval-AA v2, 𝜏³-Banking, Terminal-Bench v2.1, SciCode, Humanity's Last Exam, GPQA Diamond, CritPt, AA-Omniscience, AA-LCR. See Intelligence Index methodology for further details, including a breakdown of each evaluation and how we run them.

Intelligence Index vs. Price

Blended at 7:2:1 (cache-input-output) · USD per 1M tokens (blended)
Most attractive quadrant
Pareto line
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

While higher intelligence models are typically more expensive, they do not all follow the same price-quality curve.

Context Window

Context Window

Context window: tokens limit · Higher is better
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

Larger context windows are relevant to RAG (Retrieval Augmented Generation) LLM workflows which typically involve reasoning and information retrieval of large amounts of data.

Maximum number of combined input & output tokens. Output tokens commonly have a significantly lower limit (varied by model).

Pricing

Intelligence Index vs. Price

Blended at 7:2:1 (cache-input-output) · USD per 1M tokens (blended)
Most attractive quadrant
Pareto line
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

While higher intelligence models are typically more expensive, they do not all follow the same price-quality curve.

Performance Summary

Output Speed vs. Price

Output speed: output tokens per second · USD per 1M tokens (blended)
Most attractive quadrant
Pareto line
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

Tokens per second received while the model is generating tokens (ie. after first chunk has been received from the API for models which support streaming).

Price per token, shown in USD per million tokens. Price is a blend of cache hit, input, and output token prices using the selected ratio (default 7:2:1 cache-input-output).

Speed

Measured by Output Speed (tokens per second)

Output Speed

Output tokens per second · Higher is better
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

Tokens per second received while the model is generating tokens (ie. after first chunk has been received from the API for models which support streaming).

Figures represent performance of the model's first-party API (e.g. OpenAI for o1) or the median across providers where a first-party API is not available (e.g. Meta's Llama models).

Latency

Measured by Time (seconds) to First Token

Latency: Time To First Answer Token

Seconds to first answer token received · Accounts for reasoning model 'thinking' time
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

Time to first answer token received, in seconds, after API request sent. For reasoning models, this includes the 'thinking' time of the model before providing an answer. For models which do not support streaming, this represents time to receive the completion.

End-to-End Response Time

Seconds to output 500 tokens, calculated based on time to first token, 'thinking' time for reasoning models, and output speed

End-to-End Response Time vs. Price

End-to-end response time: end-to-end seconds to output 500 tokens · USD per 1M tokens (blended)
Most attractive quadrant
Pareto line
Reasoning models are indicated by a lightbulb icon

Price per token, shown in USD per million tokens. Price is a blend of cache hit, input, and output token prices using the selected ratio (default 7:2:1 cache-input-output).

Further Analysis
Anthropic logo
Claude Fable 5 (with fallback)
1M
Proprietary
62
$10.16
71
119.49
126.54
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Sonnet 5 (max)
1M
Proprietary
55
$1.64
74
129.10
135.85
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Opus 4.7 (max)
1M
Proprietary
55
$2.02
53
27.27
36.64
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.4 (xhigh)
1.05M
Proprietary
53
$0.91
96
178.42
183.64
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Sonnet 4.6 (max)
200k
Proprietary
48
$1.27
50
125.95
135.85
--
DeepSeek logo
DeepSeek V4 Pro (max)
1M
Open
45
$0.89
86
1.66
58.02
50.59
Kimi logo
Kimi K2.6
262k
Open
45
$0.76
263
1.35
20.21
16.95
Anthropic logo
Claude Opus 4.6 (max)
1M
Proprietary
45*
--
47
23.44
33.99
--
DeepSeek logo
DeepSeek V4 Pro (high)
1M
Open
44
$0.94
93
1.55
28.22
21.32
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.2 (xhigh)
400k
Proprietary
43*
--
93
113.75
119.12
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Opus 4.5
200k
Proprietary
42*
--
56
18.26
27.20
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.2 Codex (xhigh)
400k
Proprietary
41*
--
112
93.04
97.50
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.4 mini (xhigh)
400k
Proprietary
41
$0.54
195
128.96
131.53
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.2 (medium)
400k
Proprietary
39*
--
87
6.82
12.58
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Opus 4.6 (high)
1M
Proprietary
39*
--
41
2.22
14.28
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4.20 0309 v2
262k
Proprietary
38*
--
225
12.85
15.08
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4.3 (high)
200k
Proprietary
38
$0.48
183
18.70
21.44
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.1 (high)
272k
Proprietary
37
$0.30
152
39.98
43.28
--
Anthropic logo
Claude 4.5 Sonnet
200k
Proprietary
37
$1.27
50
13.87
23.79
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 Codex (high)
400k
Proprietary
37*
--
174
8.39
11.26
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4.3 (medium)
200k
Proprietary
37*
--
169
10.49
13.46
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Sonnet 4.6 (Non-reasoning)
200k
Proprietary
37*
--
47
1.46
12.04
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4.3 (low)
200k
Proprietary
36*
--
151
5.26
8.57
--
Kimi logo
Kimi K2.5
262k
Open
36
$0.26
122
1.38
29.84
24.36
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.1 Codex (high)
400k
Proprietary
36*
--
124
8.15
12.17
--
Anthropic logo
Claude Opus 4.5
200k
Proprietary
36*
--
49
1.56
11.67
--
Kimi logo
Kimi K2.6
262k
Open
35*
--
216
1.46
3.78
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 (high)
400k
Proprietary
35
$0.24
102
65.78
70.68
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 (medium)
400k
Proprietary
35*
--
97
29.91
35.05
--
Anthropic logo
Claude 4.1 Opus
200k
Proprietary
35*
--
--
--
--
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4
256k
Proprietary
34*
--
76
10.18
16.75
--
Kimi logo
Kimi K2 Thinking
256k
Open
33*
--
106
1.32
24.97
18.92
OpenAI logo
o3-pro
200k
Proprietary
33*
--
--
--
--
--
DeepSeek logo
DeepSeek V4 Pro
1M
Open
32*
--
99
1.74
6.81
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 (low)
400k
Proprietary
32*
--
98
5.87
10.97
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 mini (medium)
400k
Proprietary
32*
--
135
10.86
14.55
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.1 Codex mini (high)
400k
Proprietary
31*
--
157
26.33
29.51
--
OpenAI logo
o3
200k
Proprietary
31*
--
123
26.61
30.67
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.4 mini (medium)
400k
Proprietary
30*
--
169
11.69
14.66
--
Kimi logo
Kimi K2.5
262k
Open
30*
--
88
1.27
6.97
--
Anthropic logo
Claude 4.5 Sonnet
200k
Proprietary
30*
--
43
1.67
13.39
--
Anthropic logo
Claude 4.5 Haiku
200k
Proprietary
30
$0.54
106
22.61
27.32
--
Anthropic logo
Claude 4.1 Opus
200k
Proprietary
29*
--
--
--
--
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4 Fast
2M
Proprietary
28*
--
--
--
--
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.2
400k
Proprietary
27*
--
81
1.54
7.72
--
OpenAI logo
o4-mini (high)
200k
Proprietary
26*
--
111
32.40
36.91
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 mini (high)
400k
Proprietary
26
$0.04
134
56.27
60.00
--
DeepSeek logo
DeepSeek V3.2
128k
Open
25*
--
168
1.75
4.72
--
Anthropic logo
Claude 4.5 Haiku
200k
Proprietary
24*
--
96
1.09
6.31
--
OpenAI logo
gpt-oss-120b (high)
131k
Open
24
$0.07
329
0.68
8.27
6.08
OpenAI logo
o1
200k
Proprietary
24*
--
--
--
--
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 3 mini Reasoning (high)
32k
Proprietary
23*
--
--
--
--
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.1
400k
Proprietary
21*
--
154
1.57
4.83
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 nano (high)
400k
Proprietary
20*
--
156
90.04
93.25
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4.1
1M
Proprietary
20*
--
121
1.52
5.65
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 nano (medium)
400k
Proprietary
19*
--
152
49.33
52.62
--
OpenAI logo
o3-mini
200k
Proprietary
19*
--
228
8.17
10.37
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 3
16k
Proprietary
19*
--
--
--
--
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 (minimal)
400k
Proprietary
17*
--
103
1.76
6.63
--
OpenAI logo
o1-preview
128k
Proprietary
17*
--
--
--
--
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5.4 mini
400k
Proprietary
17*
--
179
0.97
3.77
--
SpaceXAI logo
Grok 4 Fast
2M
Proprietary
17*
--
--
--
--
--
Mistral logo
Mistral Large 3
256k
Open
16
$0.08
79
1.74
8.04
--
OpenAI logo
o3-mini (high)
200k
Proprietary
16
--
219
20.39
22.68
--
OpenAI logo
gpt-oss-120b (low)
131k
Open
15
$0.02
342
0.78
8.08
5.85
OpenAI logo
GPT-4.1 mini
1M
Proprietary
15
$0.05
139
1.25
4.86
--
Meta logo
Llama 4 Maverick (FP8)
128k
Open
14
$0.03
538
1.07
2.00
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 mini (minimal) East US 2 - Global Standard
400k
Proprietary
14*
--
--
--
--
--
Mistral logo
Mistral Medium 3
128k
Proprietary
12*
--
47
2.29
12.87
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4o (Nov)
128k
Proprietary
11*
--
157
1.92
5.09
--
Meta logo
Llama 4 Scout
128k
Open
10
$0.01
133
0.82
4.58
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4.1 nano
1M
Proprietary
10
$0.03
240
1.05
3.13
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4o (Aug)
128k
Proprietary
9*
--
164
1.40
4.44
--
Meta logo
Llama 3.3 70B
128k
Open
9*
--
130
2.12
5.97
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4o (May)
128k
Proprietary
8*
--
160
1.34
4.48
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-5 nano (minimal) East US 2 - Global Standard
400k
Proprietary
8*
--
--
--
--
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4 Turbo
128k
Proprietary
8*
--
114
1.73
6.11
--
Cohere logo
Command A
256k
Open
7*
--
43
2.93
14.47
--
OpenAI logo
GPT-4o mini
128k
Proprietary
7*
--
98
1.57
6.68
--
Microsoft logo
Phi-4 Mini
128k
Open
6*
--
43
0.83
12.36
--
Microsoft logo
Phi-4
16.4k
Open
5*
--
42
2.41
14.38
--
Microsoft logo
Phi-4 Multimodal
128k
Open
4*
--
18
0.82
29.21
--

Key definitions

Maximum number of combined input & output tokens. Output tokens commonly have a significantly lower limit (varied by model).

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about Microsoft Azure

The most intelligent model available on Microsoft Azure is Claude Fable 5 (with fallback) with an Intelligence Index score of 62.

The fastest model on Microsoft Azure by output speed is Llama 4 Maverick (FP8) at 537.8 tokens per second.

The model with the lowest time to first answer token on Microsoft Azure is Phi-4 Multimodal at 0.82s. Lower latency means faster initial response time.

The most affordable model on Microsoft Azure by blended price is GPT-5 nano (high) at $0.05 per 1M tokens (7:2:1 cache hit/input/output ratio).

Prices on Microsoft Azure vary up to 262x across models, from $0.05 per 1M tokens for GPT-5 nano (high) to $14.00 per 1M tokens for Claude Fable 5 (with fallback).

Yes, Microsoft Azure offers an OpenAI-compatible API, making it easy to switch from OpenAI or use existing OpenAI SDK integrations.

58 of 71 models on Microsoft Azure support JSON mode for structured output.

68 of 71 models on Microsoft Azure support function calling (tool use).

Yes, provider performance can vary over time due to infrastructure changes, load balancing, and updates. We continuously benchmark all providers and display historical performance trends in the "Over Time" charts.

When choosing a model on Microsoft Azure, consider: intelligence (for quality-sensitive tasks), output speed (for throughput-intensive tasks), latency (for interactive applications requiring quick first responses), pricing (for cost-sensitive workloads), and features like context window size, JSON mode, or function calling support.