Lowest price
Choose text-embedding-3-small
text-embedding-3-small costs $0.02 / 1M tokens, against $0.10 / 1M tokens for text-embedding-ada-002.
text-embedding-3-small vs text-embedding-ada-002: price, context and capabilities
Choose text-embedding-3-small for the lowest price and the latest release; on the other points the two are level or the data is missing.
In short
- text-embedding-3-small is 80% cheaper than text-embedding-ada-002 at the headline price ($0.02 / 1M tokens vs $0.10 / 1M tokens).
- Both accept 8k tokens per request.
- text-embedding-3-small is the newer model (January 2024, against December 2022).
Which should you choose?
Each answer below comes straight from the published prices, specifications and independent benchmark results.
Latest release
Choose text-embedding-3-small
text-embedding-3-small is the newer release (January 2024, against December 2022 for text-embedding-ada-002).
Specifications side by side
| text-embedding-3-small | text-embedding-ada-002 | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | OpenAI | OpenAI |
| Category | Embeddings | Embeddings |
| Status | Generally available | Legacy |
| Headline price | $0.02 / 1M tokens | $0.10 / 1M tokens |
| Context window | 8k | 8k |
| Max output | No data | No data |
| Released | January 2024 | December 2022 |
| Knowledge cutoff | No data | No data |
| Licence | Proprietary | Proprietary |
| Capabilities | No data | No data |
| API model id | text-embedding-3-small | text-embedding-ada-002 |
Frequently asked questions
Should I choose text-embedding-3-small or text-embedding-ada-002?
Choose text-embedding-3-small for the lowest price and the latest release; on the other points the two are level or the data is missing.
Which is cheaper, text-embedding-3-small or text-embedding-ada-002?
text-embedding-3-small is 80% cheaper than text-embedding-ada-002 at the headline price ($0.02 / 1M tokens vs $0.10 / 1M tokens).
Which has the larger context window, text-embedding-3-small or text-embedding-ada-002?
Both accept 8k tokens per request.
What is the difference between text-embedding-3-small and text-embedding-ada-002?
text-embedding-3-small is made by OpenAI and text-embedding-ada-002 by OpenAI. text-embedding-3-small is 80% cheaper than text-embedding-ada-002 at the headline price ($0.02 / 1M tokens vs $0.10 / 1M tokens). Both accept 8k tokens per request. text-embedding-3-small is the newer model (January 2024, against December 2022).
Which is newer, text-embedding-3-small or text-embedding-ada-002?
text-embedding-3-small was released on January 2024 and text-embedding-ada-002 on December 2022.