Best Ever from OpenAI ChatGPT 5.2 vs. Google Gemini 3: Which AI Model Reigns Supreme in 2025?

OpenAI strikes back with three distinct model tiers for ChatGPT 5.2

OpenAI officially released ChatGPT 5.2 on December 11, 2025, enhancing from its earlier versions of ChatGPT-5 and ChatGPT-5. It’s been an intense few months—especially with the “code red” focus in response to Google’s release of Gemini 3 in November. But the competition has pushed OpenAI to build a model series designed not just to “chat,” but to execute professional-grade knowledge work.

Here is the deep dive into ChatGPT 5.2, how it stacks up against Gemini 3, and how you can get your hands on it.

What is ChatGPT 5.2?

ChatGPT 5.2 isn’t just one model; it is a family of models integrated into a single, cohesive experience. As OpenAI realized that users have different needs at different moments—sometimes users need speed, sometimes users need deep thought.

GPT-5.2 have split the architecture into three distinct tiers:

1. ChatGPT-5.2 Instant: Optimized for speed and low latency.It handles your quick questions, emails, and conversational tasks instantly.

2. ChatGPT-5.2 Thinking: This is the heavy lifter. It utilizes extended “reasoning effort” (similar to ChatGPT-o1/o3 lineage) to think before it speaks. It is designed for coding, complex math, and logic puzzles. ChatGPT-5.2 Thinking is much better in accuracy over ChatGPT 5.1, it even achieved near 100% accuracy on 4-needle MRCR variant for 256k token input. This translates into professionals using this model for analysing long documents, research papers, transcripts while maintaining the coherence for deep analysis and synthesis.

3. ChatGPT-5.2 Pro: Our most capable, massive model. It combines the highest fidelity creative writing with the deepest reasoning capabilities. It is resource-intensive but delivers the best possible output for high-stakes professional tasks.

Unique Specifications: Under the Hood

• First-Class Deliverables: This is a game-changer. ChatGPT 5.2 doesn’t just write text; it can natively generate and edit spreadsheets (.xlsx) and presentations (.pptx) directly in the chat interface. You can say, “Analyze this data and give me a downloadable Excel file with pivot tables,” and it just happens.

• Reasoning Reliability: We achieved a score of 55.6% on SWE-Bench Pro (a rigorous software engineering benchmark which test not only python as in the case of SWE-Bench but tests on four languages which aim to be more diverse and challenging). Our “Thinking” model is significantly better at multi-step debugging than previous versions, reducing the “loop of doom” where AI fixes one bug but creates another.

• Context: We support a 256k token context window. While smaller than Gemini-3’s, GPT-5.2 internal testing shows substantially higher “recall reliability” (finding a specific needle in the haystack) at full capacity compared to competitors.

• Instant Checkout: This model integrated an agentic commerce protocol. You can research a product and buy it without leaving the chat, powered by secure third-party integrations (like Stripe).

While Gemini 3 went “wide” with massive context windows, GPT-5.2 went “deep” with reliability and structured output. Here are the specs that make 5.2 unique:

The Showdown: ChatGPT 5.2 vs. Google Gemini 3

Google launched Gemini 3 (and the Deep Think mode) in mid-November, and it is a beast of a model.

Here is a developer’s comparison of where GPT-5.2 stand:

Feature	ChatGPT 5.2 (OpenAI)	Google Gemini 3 (Google)
Core Strength	Deep Reasoning & Structured Work. Best for coding, writing complex reports, and generating files (Excel/PPT).	Multimodality & Ecosystem. Best for native video/audio understanding and integration with Google Workspace (Docs/Drive).
Reasoning	Winner. GPT-5.2 “Thinking” model generally edges out Gemini on pure logic and coding tasks (SWE-Bench Verified scores).	Strong, especially with their “Deep Think” mode, but slightly more prone to verbose explanations over direct solutions.
Context Window	256,000 Tokens. Focused on perfect recall.	1 Million+ Tokens. The clear winner if you need to upload 500 PDFs or a whole codebase at once.
Multimodality	Strong image analysis, but voice/video is still separate pipelines (mostly).	Native Multimodality. Can process video and audio natively in real-time with lower latency.
Pricing (API)	~$1.75 / 1M input tokens.	~$2.00 / 1M input tokens.
Best For	Developers, writers, analysts, and project managers.	Video creators, researchers reading massive archives, and power Google users.

The Verdict: If you want to build something (code, spreadsheets, final drafts), use ChatGPT 5.2. If you want to analyze massive amounts of media or data already in your Google Drive, use Gemini 3.

Availability & Access

OpenAI is rolling out ChatGPT 5.2 gradually to ensure system stability (these reasoning models are compute-heavy!)

Where to find it:

• Web: chatgpt.com
• Desktop: Native apps for macOS and Windows (The Windows app now supports the “Project Memory” feature).
• Mobile: iOS and Android apps (update to the latest version).

Who gets access?

• Free Users: You get limited access to GPT-5.2 Instant.
• Plus ($20/mo) & Team Users: Full access to Instant and Thinking models.
• Pro Users ($200/mo): This is a new tier. You get unlimited access to Thinking and exclusive access to GPT-5.2 Pro, plus higher rate limits.

Pricing Structure:

Model	Input	Cached input	Output
gpt-5.2 / gpt-5.2-chat-latest	$1.75	$0.175	$14
gpt-5.2-pro	$21	–	$168
gpt-5.1 / gpt-5.1-chat-latest	$1.25	$0.125	$10
gpt-5-pro	$15	–	$120

How to trigger it:

Once you have the update, you will see a model picker at the top left.

• Select “Auto” to let our router decide (it saves you credits).
• Manually select “GPT-5.2 Thinking” if you are about to give it a hard math problem or a coding task.

For more information: https://openai.com/index/introducing-gpt-5-2/