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During the weekend, the Chinese web research giant Baidu Announced the launch of two new models of AI, Ernie 4.5 and Ernie X1A multimodal language model and a model of reasoning, respectively.
Baidu claims that they offer advanced performances on a variety of measures, beating the non-seasonal V3 of Deepseek and the GPT-4.5 of Openai (how do you like the close match that Baidu has also chosen?) On several third-party reference tests such as the name of Bendu such as the name of third parties such as the name of third parties such as third-party reference tests such as third-party reference tests third parties such as tests such as third -party reference tests such as third -party reference tests such as tests such as third -party reference tests such as tests such as third -party reference tests such as tests such as Bending name C-Eval (Evaluation of the performance of Chinese LLM on knowledge and reasoning on 52 subjects), Cmmlu (massive understanding of multitasking language in Chinese), and GSM8K (Mathematical words problems).
He also claims to undermine the cost of the DEEPSEEK R1 model of DEEPSEEK from Cadren Chinese WUDERKIND with Ernie X1 by 50% and US AI Juggernaut OPENAI GPT-4.5 with Ernie 4.5 of 99%, respectively.
However, the two have significant limitations, including a lack of open source licenses in the first case (which Deepseek R1 offers) and a well -reduced context compared to the second (8,000 tokens instead of 128,000, frankly, a large amount of AI represent more information.
As X User @claudeglass Notté in an article, the small context window may only give it for customer service chatbots.
Baidu Posted on X that he intended to make open source open source Ernie 4.5 Model on June 30, 2025.
Baidu allowed access to models via its application programming interface (API) and its chatbot in Chinese Chatgpt Chinese language, known as “Ernie Bot– He answers questions, generates text, produces creative writing and interacts in conversation with users – and made Ernie Bot free to access.
Ernie 4.5: A new generation of multimodal AI
Ernie 4.5 is Baidu’s latest foundation model, designed as a native multimodal system capable of processing and understanding the text, images, audio and video, and is a clear competitor of the OPENAI GPT-4.5 model published in February 2025.
The model was optimized for better understanding, generation, reasoning and memory. Improvements include improving the prevention of hallucinations, logical reasoning and coding capacities.
According to Baidu, Ernie 4.5 surpasses the GPT-4.5 in several benchmarks while maintaining a significantly lower cost.
The progress of the model comes from several key technologies, in particular the masking of dynamic Flashmask attention, the heterogeneous multimodal mixture and experts and self-feeding after training.
Ernie X1 introduces deeply advanced reasoning capacities, emphasizing understanding, planning, reflection and evolution.
Unlike standard multimodal AI models, Ernie X1 is specially designed for complex reasoning and tools, allowing her to perform tasks such as advanced research, documents and answers based on documents, image interpretation generated by AI, code execution and web pages analysis.
The model supports a range of tools, in particular the academic research of Baidu, the search for commercial information and the research tools on the franchise. Its development is based on the progressive learning of strengthening, the formation from start to finish incorporating thought and action channels, and a reward system with multiple unified facets.
Access and availability of the API
Users can now access Ernie 4.5 and Ernie X1 via the official Ernie Bot website.
For business users and developers, Ernie 4.5 is now available via Qianfan by Baidu Ai Cloud Platform via access to the API. Ernie X1 should be available soon.
API access price:
- Ernie 4.5:
- CONSTRIBLE: 0.55 USD per 1 million tokens
- Outing: $ 2.2 per 1 million tokens
- Ernie X1:
- Entrance: $ 0.28 per 1 million tokens
- Outing: $ 1.1 per 1 million tokens
Compare this to:
- Deepseek R1
- Entrance: $ 0.55 per 1 million tokens
- Outing: $ 2.19 per 1 million tokens
Baidu also announced its intention to integrate Ernie 4.5 and Ernie X1 into its wider ecosystem, including Baidu research and Wenxiaoyan application.
Considerations for corporate decision -makers
For CIOs, CTOs, IT leaders and DevOps teams, the launch of Ernie 4.5 and Ernie X1 presents both opportunities and considerations:
- Performance vs cost – With prices significantly lower than competing models, organizations evaluating AI solutions can see cost savings by integrating ERNIE models via the API. However, other comparative analyzes and real tests may be necessary to assess performance for specific commercial applications.
- Multimodal and reasoning capacities – The ability to process and understand the text, images, audio and video could be useful for companies in sectors such as customer support, content generation, legal technology and finance.
- Tool integration – Ernie X1’s ability to work with tools such as advanced research, questions and answers based on documents and the interpretation of the code could provide automation and efficiency gains in corporate environments.
- Ecosystem and location – As Baidu AI models are optimized for the treatment of the Chinese language and regional knowledge, companies working in China or the targeting of Chinese language markets can find more effective Ernie models than global alternatives.
- Data license and confidentiality -While Baidu said that GPT-4.5 will be made open source later this summer, on June 30, 2025, it is still in three months, so companies should at least wait until this moment to assess whether it is worth deploying locally or on the cloud services hosted by the United States. The users of the company must examine Baidu policies concerning data confidentiality, compliance and use of the model before integrating these AI solutions.
The expansion of AI and future perspectives
While the development of AI accelerated in 2025, Baidu is positioned as a leader in multimodal AI technologies and based on reasoning.
The company plans to continue to invest in artificial intelligence, data centers and cloud infrastructure to improve the capacities of its foundation models.
By offering a combination of powerful performance and lower costs, the latest Baidu AI models are aimed at providing more accessible and advanced AI companies and users.
For more details, visit Ernie Bot official website.
