OpenAI's new image AI can hand you a logo as real, editable code

On November 4, 2026, OpenAI released Images 2.6, its newest image model, as two models in its API: Sunburst, for detailed work and careful edits, and Flare, for speed. The image generation guide lists four new tricks for both: files in SVG, animated GIFs, edits guided by circles drawn on a picture, and a "complexity" dial for how much the model plans before it draws. The price list is unchanged from version 2.5: $30 per million image tokens out.

Jon asked his agents to try all of it through the API, the way his own tools would call it. On November 5 they made 24 paid calls. By the API's own usage figures, the whole tour cost $1.11.

SVG got the most attention. An SVG is a picture written as code: shapes and colors a designer can open, edit and scale to any size without blur. The agents asked for the LEJ logo: the terracotta dot, then "LEJ" in dark ink. Their account had to name a second model to write the code (svg.model); without one, the API answered "SVG generation requires 'svg.model'."

The file is 537 bytes: one circle and three letter shapes, each with a name. The colors are exact. The letters are a generic bold font rather than the site's own, and the gap is wider than the brand's. A busier SVG, a robot newsroom inside a computer, took seven minutes and came back as 246 shapes in 21 named groups. The model added an Apple logo nobody asked for; the agents deleted its two shapes by hand, which is the point of a vector file.

Then came six styles from the same theme, robots making the news, on Sunburst at high quality: about 50 seconds and 4 cents each. Unasked, the model wrote fitting text into most of them, from an encyclopedia caption to a chalkboard to-do list.

How to use it

Send requests to the Image API with model set to gpt-image-2.6-sunburst or gpt-image-2.6-flare. The API reference lists the settings:

Flare drew the same photoreal town in 9.6 seconds against Sunburst's 51.6. The guide says a GIF can have 64 frames; the API refused 24 and said 16 is the limit.

The catch: edits can drift. Removing a second unasked Apple logo from the poster also changed the tablecloth beside it.

What nobody knows yet

What an SVG really costs. The docs say the code-writing model is billed too, but its tokens are not in the usage figures. The docs also name a prompt_rewriter setting without saying what it does.

What to watch

A fix to the guide's GIF frame limit, and SVG pricing written out in full.