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Since its release in March 2023, OpenAI‘s GPT-4 has stood at the forefront of the generative AI revolution. But is ChatGPT with GPT-4 worth paying for in 2024?
With the free version of ChatGPT moving from GPT 3.5 to the more powerful GPT-4o mini earlier this year, it is worth questioning whether OpenAI’s Pro plan is really worth $20 per month — particularly when GPT-4o mini has been outperforming GPT-4 on chat preferences on the chatbot-ranking LMSYS leaderboard.
So, we’re going to break down whether or not it’s worth paying for GPT-4, comparing GPT-4 vs the free version of ChatGPT.
Key Takeaways
- GPT-4 offers exclusive features like image generation with DALL-E 3, memory, and custom GPT creation.
- The Plus plan provides a larger 32,000 token context window, faster response times, and priority access to new tools.
- GPT-4o mini, available in the free version, often performs faster than GPT-4 in some real-world tests.
- A paid GPT-4 plan is ideal for power users, but casual users may find GPT-4o mini sufficient for everyday needs.
- The value of GPT-4, at $20 per month, depends on how frequently you use its advanced features.
At a Glance: GPT-4 vs GPT-3.5 Comparison
| Features | GPT-4 (Plus Plan) | GPT-4o Mini (ChatGPT Free Plan) |
|---|---|---|
| Context Window | 32,000 | 8,000 |
| Response Times | Fast | Limited according to bandwidth and availability |
| Custom GPTs | Yes | No |
| Memory | Yes | No |
| Image Generation | Yes – w/DALL-E 3 | No |
| Tables and Charts | Yes | No |
| Chat history | Yes | Yes |
| Early Access to New Features | Yes | No |
| Price | $20 per month | Free |
Is GPT-4 Worth Paying for? Pros and Cons
8 Major Differences Between Paid GPT-4 vs Free Version (ChatGPT 3.5)
1. Context Length
One of the main differentiators between GPT-4 and GPT 3.5 is that they each support different context lengths (which is the amount of text that a large language model (LLM) can process).
GPT-4 supports a larger context length of 32,000 compared to GPT 3.5’s 8,000 limit. The enhanced context handling in GPT-4 means that it can support much larger text inputs than the free 3.5 version.
2. Memory
GPT-4 memory is another big difference between the ChatGPT Plus plan and the free version. With the paid version you can instruct ChatGPT to remember and forget certain details from your conversations. This feature isn’t available with the free version.
3. Image Generation with DALL-E 3
A big selling point of GPT-4 and the Pro plan is that it offers access to image generation capabilities with DALL-E 3.
Users can enter text prompts to create a range of images, which isn’t possible with the base version of ChatGPT.
4. Voice Conversations
Both the free version of ChatGPT and GPT-4 provide voice support via mobile app versions of the platform available for Android and iPhone.
The main difference here is that the free version of ChatGPT offers access to GPT-4o mini whereas the GPT-4 version offers access to GPT-4o Mini and GPT-4o.
5. Custom GPTs
GPT-4 also offers custom GPT creation. For instance, you can create and share your own versions of ChatGPT via the GPT Store.
This is useful for scenarios where you want to create a simple chatbot that’s optimized to answer questions with a certain tone or format. The base version of ChatGPT doesn’t offer this capability.
6. Response Times
GPT-4 and the free version of ChatGPT also have different response times. According to OpenAI, the free version is limited on bandwidth and availability, whereas the GPT-4 plus version is ‘fast’.
However, in practice, we found that the free version of ChatGPT with GPT-4o mini was actually faster on some prompts — generating a response in 8 seconds compared to GPT-4’s time of 18 seconds during one of our tests.
7. Access to GPT-4o and GPT-4o mini
It’s also worth noting that ChatGPT Plus subscriptions offer access to GPT-4 and include unrestricted access to GPT-4o mini and the more powerful GPT-4o multimodal model.
At the time of writing, the free ChatGPT web app only offers access to GPT-4o mini.
8. Advanced Data Analysis
Both ChatGPT free and paid users have access to data analysis and file uploads, but the free version offers limited data analysis, vision, and file upload capabilities.
GPT-4 Pricing & Subscription
Individual: $20 per month
Teams, $25 per user per month
What about GPT-4 pricing? You can GPT-4 by purchasing a ChatGPT Plus, Teams, or Enterprise subscription.
The Plus plan starts at $20 per month and comes with GPT-4/GPT-4o/GPT-4o Mini, DALL-E 3 image generation, custom GPTs, and early access to new features.
The Teams version starts at $25 per user per month and offers everything included in the Plus version plus unlimited access to GPT-4o mini, higher message limits on GPT-4 and GPT-4o, the option to create and share GPTs with your workspace, an admin console for workspace management, and team data excluded from training by default.
Finally, the Enterprise version, with undisclosed pricing (you need to contact the sales team to request a quote), offers everything included in Team with unlimited high-speed access to GPT-4, GPT-4o, GPT-4o mini, an expanded context window, admin controls, domain verification, analytics, and more.
Verdict: GPT-4 vs GPT 3.5
A GPT-4 paid subscription is worth it for avid AI enthusiasts and users who want guaranteed access to the latest models released by OpenAI and the ability to create images with DALL-E 3.
That being said, at $20 per month, the GPT-4 access cost is steep, and the free version offers sufficient speed and performance with GPT-4o mini, which is likely to meet the needs of most users, so don’t feel like you have to upgrade just for the sake of it.
Alternatives to GPT-4
If you’re not completely sold on ChatGPT and GPT-4 or GPT-4o, then there are plenty of ChatGPT alternatives you might want to consider.
Notable competitors offering AI models with similar performance to OpenAI’s top models include Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, Anthropic’s Claude 3 Opus, xAI’s Grok (available on X), Perplexity.AI, Meta AI Assistant, and the open-source Llama 3.
Which is best for you will depend on your needs, but if you’re looking for an alternative research assistant to ChatGPT, then Gemini and Perplexity AI are great places to start.
The Bottom Line
Though GPT-4 isn’t the stand-out LLM that it once was, the Plus plan still has plenty to offer in terms of functionality that the free version doesn’t. Whether it’s enough for you to fork out $20 per month is up to you, but you can cancel at any time if you make the leap.
