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DBRX vs o4

A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.

Updated

DBRX specs · o4 specs
Verdict by category
  • PriceTie

    Neither model publishes per-token API pricing.

  • Context windowo4

    o4 accepts 200K tokens vs 32K, 6.3× the room for long documents and codebases.

  • BenchmarksTie

    No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores.

  • Modalitieso4

    o4 supports 2 modalities (text, vision) vs 1 for DBRX.

  • OpennessDBRX

    DBRX ships open weights (Databricks Open Model License); o4 is API-only.

On balance o4 edges ahead, winning 2 of 5 categories against DBRX's 1. Neither model publishes per-token API pricing. o4 accepts 200K tokens vs 32K, 6.3× the room for long documents and codebases.

No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores. They differ in modality coverage, DBRX handles text while o4 handles text, vision, which can be the deciding factor before you even look at benchmarks. DBRX ships open weights (Databricks Open Model License); o4 is API-only.

o4 is the newer of the two, released 21 months after DBRX, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. DBRX is usually picked for enterprise llm and sql generation workloads, while o4 sees more deployments in reasoning and math. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.

Side-by-side specs

SpecDBRXo4
ProviderOtherOpenAI
ReleasedMar 2024Dec 2025
Modalitiestexttext, vision
Context window32K tokens200K tokens
Max output,,
Input · 1MPricing not publishedPricing not published
Output · 1MPricing not publishedPricing not published
Knowledge cutoff,,
Open weightsYes (Databricks Open Model License)No
API availableYesYes

Pricing at scale

What you'd actually pay at typical workloads. Numbers come from each model's published per-million-token rates.

  • Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day, vs ,
  • Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day, vs ,
  • RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day, vs ,

Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates).

Price calculator

Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.

  • DBRXPricing unavailable
  • o4Pricing unavailable

Benchmarks compared

Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.

DBRXo4
  • MMLU73.7
Pick DBRX if

DBRX fits when…

  • Databricks-native
  • Tuned for enterprise SQL/code
  • Self-hosting and on-prem requirements, open weights (Databricks Open Model License).
Pick o4 if

o4 fits when…

  • Exceptional performance on hard math and reasoning benchmarks
  • Good at multi-step planning and verification
  • Strong scientific reasoning
  • Long-context tasks, handles 200K tokens vs 32K for DBRX.
  • Multimodal needs covering vision.
Don't want either?

Consider Yi-Lightning

01.AI's API-tier Chinese-leaning model, strong on Chinese benchmarks at competitive pricing.

See Yi-Lightning specsDBRX vs Yi-Lightningo4 vs Yi-Lightning

Frequently asked

  • Is DBRX or o4 cheaper?
    Per-token pricing isn't published for at least one of these models, check each model's spec page for current rates.
  • Which has the larger context window?
    o4 accepts 200K tokens vs 32K for DBRX.
  • Is DBRX or o4 better for coding?
    Both DBRX and o4 are competitive on coding benchmarks. See each model's individual spec page for HumanEval and SWE-bench scores where published. For an opinionated pick, consult our Best LLM for Coding ranking.
  • Are either of these models open source?
    DBRX ships open weights (Databricks Open Model License). o4 is API-only.
  • When were DBRX and o4 released?
    DBRX was released by Other on 2024-03-27. o4 was released by OpenAI on 2025-12-15.
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