OpenAI Launches GPT-6.1 Terra, a Cheaper AI Model Built to Operate Computers

OpenAI released GPT-6.1 Terra on Monday, Oct. 26, 2026, a mid-priced model the company says can operate a computer on a user’s behalf, clicking, typing and moving between applications to finish multi-step jobs. It replaces GPT-5.6 Terra and sits in the middle of OpenAI’s lineup, below the larger Sol and Astra models and above the lightweight Luna.

The pitch is simple: more capability for less money. OpenAI is cutting the price of the Terra tier sharply while claiming large gains on agent-style tasks, the kind of work businesses want to hand off to software instead of staff.

What GPT-6.1 Terra can do

In its launch post, OpenAI highlighted “computer use,” meaning the model looks at a screen and controls it much like a person would. Examples the company gave include taking invoices and entering them into accounting software, filling out forms, working with technical drawings and editing video. The model is available to ChatGPT Plus, Pro, Enterprise and Edu users through ChatGPT Work and the Codex coding tool, and to developers in the API under the name gpt-6.1-terra.

OpenAI also published a set of benchmark results. It said the new model scores 15 points higher than GPT-5.6 Terra on its Agents’ Last Exam test at about a third of the cost, and performs on par with GPT-6 Astra at roughly a tenth of the price. On Terminal-Bench 4.0, a test of command-line work, OpenAI reported 50.3%, up from 21.5%. The company said error rates at the lowest reasoning setting fell from 53.6% to 16.7%, reaching 4.3% at the maximum setting, and that the model runs more than three times faster than Astra and Sol.

One claim deserves caution. OpenAI says its internal testing shows a cost per task about nine times lower than Anthropic’s Claude Opus 5.5. That comparison comes from OpenAI itself and has not been independently verified.

GPT-6.1 Terra pricing

For developers, OpenAI lists API prices of $1 per million input tokens, $0.05 per million cached input tokens and $5 per million output tokens, with cache writes billed at $1.25 for a 30-minute window. The company says that is 50% lower than both GPT-5.6 Terra and GPT-6.1 Sol. Prompts longer than 272,000 tokens cost twice as much for input and 1.5 times as much for output, while batch and flex processing carry a 50% discount.

Microsoft made the model generally available in its Foundry platform the same day. Its Global Standard rates match OpenAI’s, and Microsoft lists a long-context tier at $2 input and $7.50 output per million tokens, with support for up to 1 million input tokens and regional data-zone options in the U.S., EU and Asia-Pacific.

Safety rating and the Astra backstory

OpenAI said GPT-6.1 Terra meets the “Critical” cybersecurity threshold in its Preparedness Framework, the internal system it uses to rate how much harm a model could help cause. That label brings extra safeguards and monitoring. The Next Web reported that the release follows OpenAI’s cancellation last month of GPT-6.1 Astra after that model failed internal safety tests, which makes Terra the most capable 6.1-generation model the company has shipped so far.

Software agents that can drive a desktop raise practical questions for companies, including what data the model can see, who approves its actions and how mistakes are caught. OpenAI’s lower error rates address part of that, but businesses will still need their own guardrails.

Why the launch matters

The release lands in a crowded week for AI. Anthropic has just filed to go public, and Google DeepMind recently showed off its Genie 4 world model. Price cuts like this one put pressure on rivals and make it cheaper for startups to build agent products. Readers following OpenAI’s agent strategy can also look back at our report on OpenAI’s Dots AI agents, and at Anthropic’s competing Claude Duet preview.

Sources

• OpenAI: Introducing GPT-6.1 Terra
• OpenAI API documentation: gpt-6.1-terra model page
• Microsoft Tech Community: GPT-6.1 Terra now generally available in Microsoft Foundry
• The Next Web: OpenAI’s GPT-6.1 Terra brings computer use