Previewing GPT‑5.6 Sol: a next-generation model

Easily the most interesting part of this announcement is buried in the second to last paragraph:

"We're also launching GPT‑5.6 Sol on Cerebras at up to 750 tokens per second in July, bringing frontier intelligence to customers at unprecedented speed. Access will initially be limited to select customers as we expand capacity."

750 tokens/s on a frontier model is going to be extremely interesting. I doubt this new version is anything but a version bump in terms of capabilities but if we can start getting these answers back faster, they end up being more useful.

Just off the top of my head, I can think of the tedious task of finding certain functionality within a codebase. I usually can't beat an AI agent harness at this task today. If the AI model is 3x faster I have less of chance.

I hope this doesn't become the new norm where government becomes the bottleneck for innovation in the AI space.

It's worrying that with no formal and transparent policy framework that the government will be picking winners and losers and stifling innovation.

There's been no public policy, executive order, legislation, or otherwise on this, I wonder if anyone has filed FOIA requests for these decisions or the conversations between the Executive Branch and AI companies.

"We believe in broad access, and we plan to make GPT‑5.6 Sol, Terra, and Luna generally available in the coming weeks. As part of our ongoing engagement with the U.S. government, we previewed our plans and the models’ capabilities ahead of today’s launch. At their request, we are starting with a limited preview for a small group of trusted partners whose participation has been shared with the government, before releasing more broadly. During this preview, we will continue testing and coordinating closely with partners as we work toward broader availability. We don’t believe this kind of government access process should become the long-term default. It keeps the best tools from users, developers, enterprises, cyber defenders, and global partners who need them. We are taking this short-term step because we believe it is the strongest path to broader availability in the coming weeks, while we work with the Administration to develop the cyber Executive Order framework and a repeatable process for future model releases."

This amount of courting the current administration is pretty scary imo.

Here is a trend I'm noticing:

- GPT-5 mini costs $0.25/$2 and will be discontinued in December.

- GPT-5.4 mini costs $0.75/$4.5 and is supposed to be the replacement.

- GPT-5.4 nano costs $0.2/$1.25 and, while it ranks better in benchmarks than GPT-5 mini, it's not even close when you test it in real scenarios.

So you're left being forced to go to GPT 5.4 mini if you use 5 mini today.

The same thing is happening here as their “Luna“ model will cost $1/$6.

Can't we just stay with the models we actually want? I don't need GPT 5.4 mini. GPT-5 does the job.

Maybe it’s the realization that it was never that cheap in the first place and they're forcing us to upgrade in a slow and painful way.

Haven't we established defensive and offensive security usage are intractably entangled? I.e. "patch all [security] bugs, make no mistakes" gives one a list of potential exploits to hand off to less capable models.

Doesn't that undermine all good-faith discourse on cybersecurity safeguards, controlled usage etc? Or is that overstating the case (I'm not a security researcher myself so kinda parroting).

Again, if you think we the people are getting access to AGI you're a fool.

These models aren't even that smart and they are already trying to control them and lock them down to a handful of people.

Then these executive and VC wonder why people hate AI and are against them.

Because the future is heading toward intelligence for the rich and you stuck with whatever model they want you to have.

The next step is banning open source models.

The future is not looking so bright if these models are already going locked down to whoever the government what's to have them.

This is no different than the government banning books because they don't want you to learn.

I think GPT writes code the best. How well will it write in version 5.6? It gives me chills.

Recently, I went head-to-head with GPT on nearly 2,000 lines of code, and GPT's solution was superior and faster. I even referenced multiple codebases on GitHub while trying, but they were incomparable to GPT.

So using GPT brings both fear and excitement.

The fear comes from realizing that this level of code is now the average for most people. The excitement comes from knowing that I can now study and learn at this level too.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how much more advanced the code will be with the upgrade to 5.6.

I do not like the fact that this forces people to remember on more hierarchy of "Sol vs Terra vs Luna". OpenAI was supposed to simplify their naming since at least 2025.

> Additionally, we’re introducing a new `ultra` mode that goes beyond the capabilities of a single agent by leveraging subagents to accelerate complex work.

I'm curious about how does this work? Do the subagents also get to use the same tools? Will the client be flooded with tool calls? Why extra pricing for a new "model" when the same thing can happen in the client with more controls?

And if it's an army of subagents, why do they compare it to Fable and Mythos? Those models with similar harness would probably bench better I'm guessing

Are these models still relevant for people outside the US? I get the impression we're stuck on GPT 5.5 and Opus 4.8 pretty much permanently now, and relying on Chinese models in future.

I'm going to pre-register my prediction that GPT-5.6 Sol is significantly behind Claude Fable 5, as evaluated by general consensus once time has passed for people to get familiar with both.

When will GPT-5.6 Protomolecule drop? Me and the boys on Eros can't wait to get our hands on it!

"Next generation model"

If it was the next generation, why isn't it a major version change..?

> We're also launching GPT‑5.6 Sol on Cerebras at up to 750 tokens per second in July, bringing frontier intelligence to customers at unprecedented speed.

This is really exciting. I work on voice AI, and we're still using 4.1/4.1 mini since none of the frontier models come close on latency. I'm excited to be able to have more interactive experiences, I think it'll unlock new ways of working with these models.

Great, so when do we lowly code-serfs get access to it?

> spent multiple weeks finding weaknesses, pressure-testing our system, and hardening it against real-world attacks

Multiple weeks!

Not just 5 work days, but at least 10!

Sol? Looks like openai is jealous of anthropics good model naming ability and wants to emulate it.

> Sol, Terra and Luna

So the next naming scheme might be FTX, Madoff and Enron? :^)

> We don’t believe this kind of government access process should become the long-term default. It keeps the best tools from users, developers, enterprises, cyber defenders, and global partners who need them.

I'm very glad to see them say this explicitly and prominently.

Is there a list of Gov-approved companies?

If this is the new norm, we as workers should all start look for jobs in those companies.

We need more coding benchmark score. Not sure that winning terminalbench 2.1 alone is a clear win over Fable/Mythos yet.

Some interesting stats here about the current landscape https://arena.ai/leaderboard/agent

Agent Arena (Dynamic ranking of models on how well they orchestrate tools for real-world agentic tasks, based on signals like tool reliability, task completion, and steerability.)

Top 10, Highest rank to lowest

Claude Fable 5 (High), Claude Opus 4.8 (Thinking), GPT 5.5 (xHigh), Claude Opus 4.7 (Thinking), GPT 5.5 (High), Claude Opus 4.7, Claude Opus 4.6, GPT 5.5, GPT 5.4 (High), GLM 5.2 (Max)

Text Arena View overall rankings across various AI models in text-to-text tasks across math, coding, creative writing, and other open-ended domains.

Top 10, Highest rank to lowest

claude-fable-5, claude-opus-4-6-thinking, claude-opus-4-7-thinking, claude-opus-4-6, claude-opus-4-7, muse-spark, gemini-3.1-pro-preview, gemini-3-pro, claude-opus-4-8-thinking, gpt-5.5-high

Will these ad hoc decisions by the U.S. government, without law or clear process, not hurt the coming IPO's of Anthropic and OpenAI?

If GPT-5.6 preview is not available outside US government approved "trusted partners", I don't see how the General Available can be trusted later.

Who knows what they will fix, block or change in the model between the preview and GA time. Open models can't arrive soon enough.

If it's a new generation why isn't it GPT-6?

I feel a bit like a Soviet hearing about Levi’s or the latest Springsteen release. C'mon!

What I find amusing is that people where mocking EU for regulations and now this is happening in the US. I know that Europe is behind in AI but still...

All of these LLMs are getting better at being at an LLM

But GPT-5.5 is as useful an LLM can be; it has solved lemmas I've thought about for a year, it can implement typed STLCs in Rust when I give it a formal grammar, it can help me analyze Postgres planner dumps.

It's great at tasks that have short solutions but

- they cannot learn based on a project

- their long term planning capabilities are worse than worms

- they are unconfident in decision making

- their internal representations are disgusting compared to JEPA

- they don't have any "system clock" like humans and computers do

- LLM architecture is not modular like computer architecture or human brain architecture

There's so many issues with LLMs. I wish that companies can start working on the next generation of architectures before the bubble pops

I'll buy that its next generation if the svg bicycle pelican is carrying a baby

Pleasantly surprised that it costs as GPT 5.5, thank god for the competition.

Seems like OpenAI has succumbed to the urge to give their models catchy names like Anthropic does

Seems like OpenAI's strategy to release models after Anthropic has been paying off.

Is it just me, or does it seem like Anthropic has been more of a pioneer the past few years, and OpenAI tries to copy features they like?

> We don’t believe this kind of government access process should become the long-term default.

Really glad to see some reasonably prominent pushback against this government overreach.

The information has been reporting that the government wants to individually approve which companies get access and when.

Imagine the wonderful opportunities for corruption and influence peddling, not to mention, excluding any companies that don’t support Trump

The choice of the name Sol is interesting for those Raised By Wolves fans out there… “Praise Sol!”

The sooner the USG figures out a standard process for approving releases the better. There are many differing opinions on how much to regulate AI, but I think we can all agree ad-hoc policy sucks.

> We plan to make them more broadly available to people using ChatGPT, Codex, and the API soon.

I hope this means then fable will also get released again.

Like Mythos before it, I'm simply not excited about a model I can't use

Waiting for @simonw to report on this, before I read and try it

Would love to see benchmarks on cognition's FrontierCode

> As part of our ongoing engagement with the U.S. government, we previewed our plans and the models’ capabilities ahead of today’s launch. At their request, we are starting with a limited preview for a small group of trusted partners whose participation has been shared with the government, before releasing more broadly.

The clowns in the US administration can barely remain coherent from one sentence to the next.

Having them be the gatekeepers of technological progress in 2026 is fucking lame.

all the emphasis on cyber security. feels like a reaction to anthropic, not a real next generation.

What happened to the nano/mini/standard/pro naming scheme, which worked perfectly fine and is intuitive to understand? Why does OpenAI insist on having the most inconsistent and confusing model and product names possible?

I'm looking at you Codex.

No comments on the cerebras version that might finally enable intelligent voice mode instead of being stuck with 4o-mini class

Doesn't it strike anyone as strange that SOL, TERRA, and LUNA are all quasi-scam crypto tickers?

I'm really getting sick of reading about safeguards and what I'm not allowed to do on every model release.

So, where's the export restrictions?

Of course the idiots in Washington have bought the hype - hook, line, and sinker.

What a party pooper the current US government is... I'm not excited right now at all, while normally a new GPT release would be so much fun to test out.

Those taking issue with the clear deference to the current U.S. administration would seemingly prefer it be the exact same degree of preemptive compliance and collaboration, just done behind closed doors as it was with the Biden administration. The sausage is apparently far more palatable when you only find out about the overreach, pressuring, implied threats, and censorship years later in House Judiciary Committees. Or even better if you don’t through use of NSL gag orders or implied threat of lawfare!

they're trying to be anthropic with these model names

Pre-official discussions:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48678789

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48683021

Not really news until it's widely available.

Anyone know the latest around Fable being re-released after gov smackdown?

Thoughts

1. Naming convention is copied from Anthropic and honestly is more catchy than a number (amongst normal people)

2. How in the world did Anthropic have to do all the theatrics about Mythos just to have OpenAI release an equivalent or stronger model a month later without any drama???

3. Cheaper models are just don’t fit any usecase imo and OpenAI knows it so they keep increasing the floor - I’m still convinced task per capability is reduced with each release

4. How in the world would open source models keep up with the multi layer security? Either this security is all theater or we will finally see a ceiling in open source models because by definition they can’t have those protections

5. Cybersecurity things are boring to me because it’s all zero sum cat and mouse games

    Flagged activity can also trigger account-level review across relevant conversations and risk signals, consistent with our terms and policies around content retention and review. Looking beyond a single conversation helps our systems distinguish persistent malicious behavior from legitimate dual-use security work, where similar technical concepts may appear in very different contexts.

Fascinating!

Every conversation you have with these "more capable" models will be monitored and joined up and then your entire account might one day be tagged as Distiller or Cyber Threat Actor or whatnot. When combined with identity verification (which isn't discussed in this press release), expect people to be falsely flagged and banned from ever using OpenAI models again.

Wish I could find the thread from last week where discussions of exactly this kind of thing were dismissed as daft and outlandish.

I didn't know that I was color blind, but thanks to those charts, I think I need to see a doctor...

I mean, you can read them even without the colors, but who on earth thought that those are a good set of colors? Oh, I forgot it was probably someone on 'Sol'.

Another model family, another naming scheme to get used to.

Sol Ultra ≈ Pro

Sol ≈ Standard

Terra ≈ Mini

Luna ≈ Nano

> We don’t believe this kind of government access process should become the long-term default. It keeps the best tools from users, developers, enterprises, cyber defenders, and global partners who need them.

My brother in Christ, then why did you (and your competitors) spend years telling the government you needed them to tie your hands behind your back? Did you really think they'd just give you a crown that says "Gatekeeper Of All Neural Networks"?

Are GPT 5.5 and Opus 4.8 the last models we're going te be allowed to use in Europe? Is there going to be a cut, and we're only be allowed to use less capabale models outside of the US?

I mean, if they deem Fable 5 to powerful to share with the rest of the world, what's left for us?

I hate not being able to use the latest models. There needs to be a much faster resolution to whatever is happening with the federal government.

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This is disgusting groveling to the Orange Shit Stain.

Beam me up Scotty. No intelligent life forms on this planet.

Other than the worst naming I have ever seen (Sol / Terra / Luna), the pricing is still expensive:

> GPT‑5.6 is priced per 1M tokens across three model sizes:

> Sol is $5 input / $30 output;

> Terra is $2.50 input / $15 output

> Luna is $1 input / $6 output.

The OpenAI casino has never been more ready to take your money on gambling even more tokens.