Perplexity: Sonar✓ Catalog verified
Sonar is lightweight, affordable, fast, and simple to use — now featuring citations and the ability to customize sources. It is designed for companies seeking to integrate lightweight question-and-answer features optimized for speed.
Overview
Sonar is lightweight, affordable, fast, and simple to use — now featuring citations and the ability to customize sources. It is designed for companies seeking to integrate lightweight question-and-answer features optimized for speed.
Access: available through the official Perplexity API. Context window: 127K.
Specifications
| API identifier | perplexity/sonar |
| Provider | Perplexity |
| Model type | Multimodal LLM |
| Context window | 127K catalog |
| Input modalities | text · image |
| Output modalities | text |
| Released | Jan 27, 2025 |
| Moderated | No |
| Architecture modality | text+image->text |
Pricing
Live pricing components for perplexity/sonar as published in the catalog.
| Pricing component | Raw unit price | Normalized | Unit |
|---|---|---|---|
| Prompt tokens | $0.000001 | $1.00 / 1M | Per input token |
| Completion tokens | $0.000001 | $1.00 / 1M | Per output token |
| Request fee | N/A | N/A | Per request |
| Image fee | N/A | N/A | Per image unit |
| Web search fee | $0.005 | $0.005000 | Per search request |
Cost calculator
Estimate monthly spend from your own token volumes.
Estimated Total Cost
$0.7Calculated from current list pricing in the ModelsAtlas catalog.Capabilities
| Capability | Status | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Visual Understanding | ✓ Supported | Image and document analysis support |
| Audio Processing | Not advertised | Speech and voice aligned flows |
| Tool Calling | Not advertised | Supports tools / function calling |
| Self-Hosting | Not advertised | Deploy outside managed APIs |
Capability signals
Directional signals derived from model metadata and capability tags — not official benchmark submissions.
Quick start
Call Perplexity: Sonar through an OpenAI-compatible client.
from openai import OpenAI
client = OpenAI(
base_url="https://openrouter.ai/api/v1",
api_key="YOUR_API_KEY"
)
response = client.chat.completions.create(
model="perplexity/sonar",
messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Explain quantum physics."}]
)
print(response.choices[0].message.content)Alternatives
Closest models by context window from a different provider.
| Model | Provider | Context | Input /1M | Actions |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| AllenAI: Olmo 2 32B Instruct | Allenai | 128K | $0.05 | View → |
| Amazon: Nova Micro 1.0 | Amazon | 128K | $0.04 | View → |
Sources & attribution
Pricing and metadata are maintained in the ModelsAtlas catalog.
Frequently asked questions
How much does Perplexity: Sonar cost?
$1.00 per 1M input tokens and $1.00 per 1M output tokens on the official Perplexity API.
What is the context window of Perplexity: Sonar?
Perplexity: Sonar supports up to 127K tokens of context.
Does Perplexity: Sonar support tool / function calling?
Perplexity: Sonar does not advertise first-class tool/function calling. Check vendor docs for the latest capabilities.
How do I access Perplexity: Sonar?
Use the official Perplexity API with the model id `perplexity/sonar`. See the Quick start section above for code examples.