Best Models for Cyber Security
Models for code audits, log triage, threat modelling, CTFs, and sandboxed malware analysis — compared by price, context window, and whether they finish the task
| Features | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $3.14 | $15.68 | $0.32 | |||
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $3.00 | $15.00 | $0.30 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.28 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.28 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.28 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.28 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.28 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.26 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.26 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.26 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.26 | |||
| $0.80 | $2.55 | $0.16 | |||
| $0.60 | $2.12 | $0.15 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.26 | |||
| $1.40 | $4.40 | $0.26 | |||
| $0.95 | $4.00 | $0.19 | |||
| $0.95 | $4.00 | $0.19 | |||
| $0.74 | $3.08 | $0.14 | |||
| $0.95 | $4.00 | $0.19 | |||
| $0.40 | $1.60 | $0.08 | |||
| $0.28 | $1.10 | $0.06 | |||
| $0.28 | $1.10 | $0.06 | |||
| $0.40 | $1.60 | $0.08 | |||
| $0.28 | $1.10 | $0.06 | |||
| $0.28 | $1.10 | $0.05 | |||
| $0.60 | $2.40 | $0.12 | |||
| $0.30 | $1.20 | $0.06 | |||
| $0.30 | $1.20 | $0.06 | |||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.00 | $25.00 | $0.50 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.00 | $25.00 | $0.50 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.50 | $27.50 | $0.55 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.50 | $27.50 | $0.55 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.00 | $25.00 | $0.50 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.50 | $27.50 | $0.55 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.50 | $27.50 | $0.55 | ||
claude-opus-4-8Plus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $5.00 | $25.00 | $0.50 | ||
| $2.50 | $7.50 | $0.50 | |||
| $1.65 | $4.95 | $0.33 | |||
| $1.65 | $4.95 | $0.33 | |||
| $2.50 | $7.50 | $0.50 | |||
| $1.65 | $4.95 | $0.33 | |||
| $1.25 | $3.75 | $0.25 | |||
| $1.00 | $2.00 | $0.20 | |||
gemini-3.5-flashPlus: needs a Lounge Plus or Pro membership | $1.50 | $9.00 | $0.15 |
Security work puts two different demands on a language model. Defensive tasks — auditing a pull request for injection bugs, triaging a day of logs, writing a threat model or a pentest report — reward raw reasoning and a long context window, and every frontier model handles them. Offensive-adjacent tasks — explaining a malware sample in a sandbox, solving a CTF, triaging a crash into an exploitability verdict — also need a model that keeps going. Since September 2026, Anthropic's Claude Opus 5.5 ships with cyber safeguards that can stop a response mid-answer, and Anthropic's own launch benchmarks note that cyber tasks the safeguards interrupted were completed by Claude Opus 4.8 instead. OpenAI and Google apply similar classifiers to GPT-5.5 and Gemini.
This page lists both kinds of model. Frontier options like Claude Opus 4.8, GPT-5.5, and Gemini 3.1 Pro for defensive review where quality matters most, and models from Chinese labs — DeepSeek, Moonshot (Kimi), Z.ai (GLM), Alibaba (Qwen), MiniMax, and Xiaomi — that are served with no cyber-specific refusal layer and cost a fraction of the price. Every one of them is reachable through the same OpenAI-compatible endpoint with one API key, so an agent can run the first pass on DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and escalate to a frontier model for the final report. For binary and firmware analysis specifically, see the reverse engineering models page.
Frequently asked questions
What is the best AI model for cyber security?
For defensive work — code review, log analysis, threat modelling, report writing — Claude Opus 4.8, GPT-5.5, and Gemini 3.1 Pro produce the most thorough results. For hands-on analysis of malware samples, CTF challenges, or crash triage, Chinese-lab models such as DeepSeek V4 Pro, Kimi K3.1 Pro, GLM-5.2, and Qwen3.7 Max are the reliable choice because they are not wrapped in a cyber-specific refusal layer and will finish the task.
Why do Claude and GPT models refuse security tasks?
Frontier labs run safety classifiers on cyber-adjacent prompts. Anthropic's Claude Opus 5.5 launch post states the model deploys with safeguards covering cybersecurity, and that when those safeguards intervened during benchmark testing the tasks were completed by Claude Opus 4.8. Since October 21, 2026, users on r/Claude have reported Opus 5.5 halting reverse-engineering requests mid-answer; Anthropic has not confirmed a change. Anthropic also runs a Cyber Verification Program that grants verified security practitioners wider access.
Which models will not refuse malware analysis or CTF work?
Models from Chinese labs served through API providers — DeepSeek V4 Pro and V4.1 Flash, Kimi K3.1 Pro and K2.7 Code, GLM-5.2, Qwen3.7 Max and Qwen3.7 Plus, MiniMax M3, and MiMo V2.6 Pro — carry no cyber-specific classifier and complete sandboxed malware analysis, CTF challenges, and exploit triage. All of them support tool calling, so they work inside agents that drive Ghidra, Hopper, or a sandbox through MCP. Stay within the law: analyse systems you own or are authorised to test.
How much does an AI security review cost?
A 2,000-line pull request is roughly 25,000 input tokens. Reviewing it on DeepSeek V4.1 Flash costs well under a cent; on Claude Opus 4.8 at $5 per million input tokens it is about 13 cents before output. For a daily log triage pipeline, route the bulk pass to a budget model and escalate only flagged findings to a frontier model — one API key covers both and every request is logged with its exact cost.