Sora vs Veo

0:01 Sora is gone: OpenAI ended the Sora web and app experiences on Apr 26, 2026 and the Sora API on Sep 24, 2026, and named no replacement API. ChatGPT does not make videos either; its pricing page lists no video feature on Nov 6, 2026. So "Sora vs Veo" now means choosing among other makers. On Arena's text-to-video leaderboard dated Nov 5, 2026, Google's Gemini Omni models hold the top three places, FLUX 3 Video, Grok Imagine Video 1.5 and ByteDance's Seedance follow, and Google's Veo 3.1 sits 14th to 17th, just behind the retired Sora 2 Pro (13th). Veo is the easiest to reach through a Gemini plan; Runway sells clear credit plans; the pages below say where each one wins. Learn more: https://ai.vi.ki/veo and https://ai.vi.ki/best-ai-video-generator.

Quick facts

How Sora compared while it ran

3:27 Sora 2, released on Sep 30, 2025, made video with synchronized dialogue and sound effects and came with a social iOS app, later Android. Its API priced sora-2 at $0.10 a second and sora-2-pro at $0.30 to $0.70 a second and allowed clips of 16 or 20 seconds, extendable to 120 seconds. Every Sora video carried C2PA metadata and, at launch, a visible watermark.

On Arena's board, which still lists retired models, Sora 2 Pro scores 1367 (13th) and Sora 2 1343 (19th), against Veo 3.1 with audio at 1363 (14th). The two were close, Sora 2 Pro a few points ahead, both well behind today's leaders.

0:54 OpenAI announced the shutdown on Mar 24, 2026; an OpenAI spokesperson told CBS News the company had "decided to discontinue Sora", tied the decision to compute priorities, and said the Sora team would work on world simulation for robotics. TechCrunch recounted the deepfakes and copyrighted characters that dogged the app. Purchased Sora credits still work for Codex, and exports went through sora.chatgpt.com/sunset.

The leaderboard today

Source: Text-to-video leaderboard, Arena, Nov 5, 2026 (887,494 votes across 50 models). Kling 4.0, sold through Runway, is not on the board.

Verdict by task

Veo and Gemini Omni

Veo 3.1 makes text-to-video and image-to-video with native sound effects, ambient sound and dialogue, in 8-second clips that Scene Extension lengthens, at 1080p and 4K, with first and last frame and camera controls. It is in the Gemini app, Google Flow, the Gemini API, AI Studio and Google Vids. Google's plans give AI Pro a "limited trial" of Veo 3.1 Lite and list Veo 3.1 on Ultra; no Veo API price appeared on Google's pricing page read for this article.

Gemini Omni, Google's newer video model, edits video by conversation and takes images, text, video or audio as references; it drafts at 360p and upscales to 1080p or 4K. In the API, gemini-omni-1.2-flash costs about $0.07 a second at 720p, $0.023 at 360p and $0.209 at 4K. Google AI Plus, Pro and Ultra all include it in Flow, with 200 to 25,000 credits.

Runway, Kling and others

Runway has Free (125 credits once), Standard at $15 a month ($12 yearly) for 52 seconds of Gen-4.5, Pro at $35 for 187 seconds and Max at $95 for 791 seconds; inside Runway you can also pick Kling 4.0, Seedance 2.0 Pro and Aleph 2.0. Kling's own site gave no plan or model text to read on Nov 6, 2026, so its prices are not verified here. FLUX 3 Video costs from $0.15 a second in HD through Black Forest Labs' API, and xAI's Grok Imagine Video 1.5 $0.080 a second. Midjourney only animates images, 5 seconds extendable to 21.

What OpenAI offers instead

OpenAI's own pages point Sora users to creating images in ChatGPT; ChatGPT Images 2.6 can make animated GIFs of 2 to 16 frames, which is not video. For anything longer, use one of the tools above. More alternatives are on When to Use Something Else.

What testers found

0:49 Parker Prompts paid for the $20 plans of ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini for a month and, in an Aug 12, 2026 video, found Google's the only one of the three that makes video, with Veo in the Gemini app, from a text prompt, a still photo or built-in templates. He noted the catch: the full, highest-quality Veo sits on the pricier Ultra plan, and the $20 tier gets a lighter, faster version with tighter limits, which matches Google's "limited trial" of Veo 3.1 Lite on AI Pro.

0:57 Paul J Lipsky came to the same answer in his 2026 comparison of the same plans: Gemini is the only one that can make videos, "and it does it quite well", including with an avatar of yourself and templates, while ChatGPT "doesn't have video generation anymore".

Frequently asked questions

Is Sora still available? No. The Sora app and website ended on Apr 26, 2026 and the Sora API on Sep 24, 2026; OpenAI named no successor video model.

What is the best alternative to Sora? On Arena's text-to-video votes of Nov 5, 2026, Google's Gemini Omni ranks first, ahead of FLUX 3 Video, Grok Imagine Video 1.5 and Seedance. Veo 3.1 is the Google model most plans name, and Runway sells the clearest credit plans.

Was Sora better than Veo? Narrowly, by the votes still on Arena: Sora 2 Pro scores 1367 and Veo 3.1 with audio 1363. Both now trail Gemini Omni and several others by more than 100 points.

Can ChatGPT make videos now? No video generation appears on ChatGPT's pricing page as of Nov 6, 2026. ChatGPT Images 2.6 can make short animated GIFs.

Can I still download my Sora videos? OpenAI's Help Center pointed users to sora.chatgpt.com/sunset to export, and says data is deleted after any final export window. Purchased Sora credits can still be spent on Codex.

Sources

• What to know about the Sora discontinuation, OpenAI Help Center, read Nov 6, 2026
• Sora 2 model, Deprecations and Video generation guide, OpenAI API docs, read Nov 6, 2026
• Sora 2 is here, OpenAI, Sep 30, 2025
• Launching Sora responsibly, OpenAI, Sep 30, 2025
• Introducing Images 2.6, OpenAI, Nov 4, 2026
• ChatGPT pricing, OpenAI, read Nov 6, 2026
• OpenAI's Sora was the creepiest app on your phone, now it's shutting down, TechCrunch, Mar 24, 2026
• OpenAI discontinues Sora, CBS News, Mar 24, 2026
• Veo and Gemini Omni, Google DeepMind, read Nov 6, 2026
• Google AI plans, Google, read Nov 6, 2026
• Gemini API pricing, Google AI Studio, read Nov 6, 2026
• Pricing, Runway, read Nov 6, 2026
• Pricing, Black Forest Labs, read Nov 6, 2026
• Models, xAI, read Nov 6, 2026
• Video, Midjourney, read Nov 6, 2026
• Text-to-video leaderboard, Arena, Nov 5, 2026, read Nov 6, 2026
• Introducing Sora 2, OpenAI, Sep 30, 2025 (video)
• OpenAI announces it is shutting down video platform Sora, NBC News, Mar 24, 2026 (video)
• ChatGPT vs Claude vs Gemini: Which $20 AI Plan Is Worth It?, Parker Prompts, Aug 12, 2026 (video)
• ChatGPT Plus vs Claude Pro vs Gemini Pro: The Best $20 AI Plan, Paul J Lipsky, Jun 7, 2026 (video)