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Model comparison

Cohere Command A+ vs Kimi K2.6

Cohere against Moonshot AI, compared on context, price, and verified benchmark results.

Catalog record checked September 26, 2026Individual provider fields may changeEvidence confidence: High — see receipts below

Cohere

Cohere Command A+

Balanced · Open weights

vs

Moonshot AI

Kimi K2.6

Balanced · Open weights

AI model capability comparison
SpecificationCohere Command A+Kimi K2.6
ProviderCohereMoonshot AI
TierBalancedBalanced
Context window128KWinner: 262K
Max output64KNot verifiedUnverified
Input / 1M tokensWinner: $0.80$0.95
Output / 1M tokensWinner: $3.20$4
WeightsOpenOpen
Parameters218B total / 25B active (sparse MoE)1T total / 32B active (MoE, 384 experts)
Reasoning levelslow, medium, highNot verifiedUnverified
Modalitiestext, imagetext, image, video
LicenseApache 2.0Modified MIT
API model idcommand-a-plus-05-2026kimi-k2.6
ReleasedMay 20, 2026April 20, 2026
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index (2026-09-26)13.1Winner: 27

Prices are USD per million tokens at standard rates, excluding batch and caching discounts. Bold indicates the better figure where one is objectively better. Values we could not confirm from the provider are shown as “Not verified” rather than estimated.

Benchmark receipts

Where each score comes from, and how far it can be compared across models.

  • 2026-09-26
    Artificial Analysis

    Composite index blending reasoning, knowledge, and coding evals into one 0–100 score.

    Comparable with caveatOnly same-version scores are comparable. v4.3.2 was rebaselined (the top score fell from 66 on v4.1.1 to ~58), so v4.1.1 figures must not be compared with v4.3.2 figures — check measuredAt.

Pricing tiers

Cohere Command A+: Azure-hosted Global rate $0.80/$3.20 per MTok (effective 2026-07-01; Data Zone $0.88/$3.52). Cohere-direct publishes no per-token price: open weights (Apache 2.0), a free rate-limited trial API, and Model Vault/enterprise licensing. Cohere calls it the last model in the Command A family. 218B/25B active sparse MoE.

Kimi K2.6: $0.95/$4.00 per MTok on the Moonshot API; cached input $0.16. No documented hard output cap; evals ran 98,304-token generations.

BalancedOpen weightsRecord checked September 26, 2026

Cohere Command A+

Command A+ is Cohere's open-weight (Apache 2.0) 218B/25B sparse MoE for enterprise use.

Best for

  • Open-weight deployments
  • Enterprise RAG
  • Tool use

Watch out

The $0.80/$3.20 figure is the Azure-hosted rate, not a Cohere-direct price — Cohere itself sells licenses and a free rate-limited trial, so budget by deployment path.

BalancedOpen weightsRecord checked September 26, 2026

Kimi K2.6

Kimi K2.6 is Moonshot's open-weight volume workhorse — a 1T MoE with native image/video input at 256K context, the base Kimi K2.7-Code and K3 build on.

Best for

  • Open-weight volume work
  • Multimodal input on a budget
  • Self-hosting at mid size

Watch out

256K context is small next to K3's 1M; video input is experimental (official API only). No documented hard output cap.

When the cheaper one wins

Cohere Command A+ is cheaper on output at $3.20 per million tokens against $4 for Kimi K2.6 — about 1.3×. Use the cheaper tier for classification, extraction, summarisation, and any task where the expensive model’s extra score does not change the accepted output. The expensive one only pays if your hardest task actually fails on the cheap tier. These are standard-tier API rates, excluding batch and cache discounts.

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Evidence confidence: High

How strong and complete the evidence behind this comparison is — not a prediction of which model is better.

  • Pricing verified on both sides — Input and output rates are verified for both models.
  • 3/5 core specs verified on both sides — Not published for at least one side: max output, reasoning levels.
  • 1 shared named benchmark with differing scores — Measured on: Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.
  • Verified within the last 90 days — Newest catalog check was 2 days ago.
  • Both models carry source citations — Each side has at least two catalog sources on record.

Source receipts

Each catalog figure was checked against the provider or an independent second source on the date shown.

Related comparisons

Diving deeper on one model? Cohere Command A+ · Kimi K2.6

Common questions

Cohere Command A+ vs Kimi K2.6

Answered from the verified figures on this page rather than general guidance.

Is Cohere Command A+ or Kimi K2.6 cheaper for input?
Cohere Command A+ is cheaper at $0.80 per million input tokens, against $0.95 for Kimi K2.6 — roughly 1.2× the price. Output tokens usually dominate a real bill, so weigh the output rate more heavily than the input rate. These are base rates; Cohere Command A+ has tiered pricing: Azure-hosted Global rate $0.80/$3.20 per MTok (effective 2026-07-01; Data Zone $0.88/$3.52). Cohere-direct publishes no per-token price: open weights (Apache 2.0), a free rate-limited trial API, and Model Vault/enterprise licensing. Cohere calls it the last model in the Command A family. 218B/25B active sparse MoE. Kimi K2.6 has tiered pricing: $0.95/$4.00 per MTok on the Moonshot API; cached input $0.16. No documented hard output cap; evals ran 98,304-token generations.
Is Cohere Command A+ or Kimi K2.6 cheaper for output?
Cohere Command A+ is cheaper at $3.20 per million output tokens, against $4 for Kimi K2.6 — roughly 1.3× the price. Output tokens usually dominate a real bill, so weigh the output rate more heavily than the input rate. These are base rates; Cohere Command A+ has tiered pricing: Azure-hosted Global rate $0.80/$3.20 per MTok (effective 2026-07-01; Data Zone $0.88/$3.52). Cohere-direct publishes no per-token price: open weights (Apache 2.0), a free rate-limited trial API, and Model Vault/enterprise licensing. Cohere calls it the last model in the Command A family. 218B/25B active sparse MoE. Kimi K2.6 has tiered pricing: $0.95/$4.00 per MTok on the Moonshot API; cached input $0.16. No documented hard output cap; evals ran 98,304-token generations.
Which has the larger context window, Cohere Command A+ or Kimi K2.6?
Kimi K2.6 accepts 262K tokens against 128K for Cohere Command A+. This only matters if you routinely send very long documents or large codebases.
Should I use Cohere Command A+ or Kimi K2.6?
Both sit in the balanced tier, so the choice usually comes down to price and context rather than capability. Cohere Command A+ suits open-weight deployments; Kimi K2.6 suits open-weight volume work.

Next step

Choosing between them

The verified figures that separate this pair, computed from the catalog rather than restated boilerplate.

  • Input price: Cohere Command A+ costs $0.80 per 1M tokens versus $0.95 for Kimi K2.6 — a 1.2x difference at the headline tier.
  • Context: Kimi K2.6 takes 262K against 128K for Cohere Command A+ — only decisive if your prompts approach the smaller window.
  • Measured capability: Kimi K2.6 leads Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index 27 to 13.1 (measured 2026-09-26).
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