Perplexity · language model
Sonar Reasoning Pro: pricing, context and benchmarks
Sonar Reasoning Pro is a language model from Perplexity released on March 7, 2025. It costs $2 per million input tokens and $8 per million output tokens, with a 128K-token context window. No independent score has been published for it so far.
What you need to know about Sonar Reasoning Pro
Sonar Reasoning Pro was released by Perplexity (United States) on March 7, 2025. It accepts text and images as input and produces text. Its context window reaches 128,000 tokens, larger than 19 % of the models in the registry, and it can write up to 115,200 tokens in one go.
Released more than 1 year ago, it belongs to a generation most vendors have since superseded.
Sonar Reasoning Pro pricing
On OpenRouter, Sonar Reasoning Pro costs $2 per million input tokens and $8 per million output tokens. Counting three tokens read for every token written, its average price is $3.5 per million, more expensive than 81 % of paid models (4.6 times the median of $0.76).
A concrete example: a task that sends 2,000 tokens (about 1,500 words) and receives a 500-token answer costs $0.008. At 1,000 tasks a day, budget $240 a month. The price calculator redoes this with your own volumes.
Performance and benchmarks
Epoch AI does not yet publish a capabilities index for Sonar Reasoning Pro. We therefore show no made-up performance rating: only price, context and features count towards its score.
Features, privacy and local use
- It does not support tool calling: it is not suited to driving an AI agent that has to act.
- It is a reasoning model: it "thinks" before answering, which helps on hard tasks but uses more output tokens.
Its weights are not published: it can only be used through the Perplexity API or a broker such as OpenRouter, which means sending your data off your machines.
Other Perplexity models
| Model | Released | Avg. price | ECI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sonar Pro Search | Oct 30, 2025 | $6 | — |
| Sonar Pro | Mar 7, 2025 | $6 | — |
| Sonar Deep Research | Mar 7, 2025 | $3.5 | — |
| Sonar | Jan 27, 2025 | $1 | — |
Verdict
Sonar Reasoning Pro scores 20/100 on our grid, which only uses published figures.
Limitations
- Expensive: costlier than 81 % of paid models.
- No tool calling: unusable as an agent's brain.
- No independent score published: performance cannot be verified.
- Older generation, often replaced by a newer model from the same vendor.
Avoid if…
- you process large volumes on a tight budget;
- your data must not leave your servers;
- you are building an agent that must call tools;
- your tasks are mostly simple: a non-reasoning model will cost less.
Alternatives
- Mistral Large$3
- GPT Audio$4.38
- GPT-4o (2024-11-20)$4.38
- Command R+ (08-2024)$4.38
- GPT-4o (2024-08-06)$4.38
- GPT-4o$4.38
Comparisons and tools
Learn more
Frequently asked questions
How much does Sonar Reasoning Pro cost?
$2 per million input tokens and $8 per million output tokens on OpenRouter (checked October 25, 2026). A task with 2,000 tokens read and 500 written costs $0.008.
How big is Sonar Reasoning Pro's context window?
128,000 tokens, roughly 96,000 words, with a maximum of 115,200 output tokens.
Can Sonar Reasoning Pro run locally?
No, Perplexity does not publish its weights: it is API-only.
Is Sonar Reasoning Pro suitable for an AI agent?
No: without tool calling it cannot act, only answer.
What are the alternatives to Sonar Reasoning Pro?
The closest models on price and performance are Mistral Large, GPT Audio, and GPT-4o (2024-11-20).
Related articles
- Mistral AI: models, pricing and agentsOctober 25, 2026
- LLM benchmarks: how to read model rankingsOctober 24, 2026
- Running a local LLM: hardware, software, and limitationsOctober 24, 2026
- Open-source or closed models for your AI agents?October 5, 2026
Neutrality. No affiliate links. No vendor pays to be reviewed, rated or ranked. Reviews are directed by François Chollet, neutral and factual, and every data point is dated and sourced. How we score