Head to head · Decision models · October 2026 research run
Microsoft-Decision-1 vs pplx-decider
pplx-decider scores 62.9 (B) on agent readiness against Microsoft-Decision-1's 39 (E), and leads in every scored category. Both do decision models. Microsoft-Decision-1 is cheaper for decision models, $0 against $0 per 1M tokens.
Best decision models for AI agents · All 91 decisions comparisons
Which one, for what
Best for Routing, classification, prioritisation and rubric checks over text, where a fixed set of options and a low price per token matter more than generated text.
Also in its favour
- Cheaper for decision models, $0 against $0 per 1M tokens
Watch for
Public preview only. Microsoft's post gives no general availability date and states no licence for the hosted model
Best for High-volume classification, routing and rubric scoring over text and images where a team wants a low hosted price and the option to run the same weights itself.
Ahead on
- Reliability, 61 against 30
- Schema & documentation, 90 against 43
- Agent ergonomics, 76 against 50
- Security & auth, 61 against 52
- Payments & pricing, 25 against 20
- Maintenance & community, 62 against 40
- Transparency & trust, 52 against 32
Also in its favour
- Cheaper for decision models, $0 against $0 per 1M tokens
- A hosted endpoint, with nothing to install
Watch for
The Decisions API was released in October 2026, so its incident record is days long, and Perplexity's FAQ says it gives no uptime guarantee
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Microsoft-Decision-1 | pplx-decider | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Reliability | 16%20 | 30 | 61 | pplx-decider +31 |
| Performance | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13%16.2 | 43 | 90 | pplx-decider +47 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13%16.2 | 50 | 76 | pplx-decider +26 |
| Security & auth | 14%17.5 | 52 | 61 | pplx-decider +9 |
| Payments & pricing | 10%12.5 | 20 | 25 | pplx-decider +5 |
| Task success | 10%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7%8.8 | 40 | 62 | pplx-decider +22 |
| Transparency & trust | 7%8.8 | 32 | 52 | pplx-decider +20 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | E 39/100 | B 62.9/100 |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Microsoft-Decision-1 | pplx-decider |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | Model API | Model API |
| Vendor | Microsoft | Perplexity |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | https://api.perplexity.ai/v1/decisions |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | OAuth or key | API key |
| Pricing | Pay per use | Pay per use |
| Price for decision models | free | free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Not stated. The announcement and OpenRouter's model page name no licence, and no weights repository was found. | Apache-2.0 for the published weights. The hosted Decisions API is a proprietary service |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | yes |
| Last release | 2026-10-09 | 2026-10-05 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | couldn't be read |
| Privacy policy last updated | couldn't be read | |
| Customer content may train models | couldn't be read | |
| Terms restrict automated access | couldn't be read | |
| Terms restrict benchmarking | couldn't be read | |
| Terms or service can change without notice | couldn't be read | |
| Arbitration or class-action waiver | couldn't be read |
Verdicts
Microsoft-Decision-1
Microsoft publishes $0.042 per million input tokens, with output free, and the model is callable through Microsoft Foundry and OpenRouter. It is in public preview. No licence, model-specific retention statement, rate limit or deprecation policy was found, and the Foundry route needs an Azure deployment and an Entra token. Latency and accuracy figures are Microsoft's claims.
pplx-decider
The hosted Decisions API has an OpenAPI description, typed questions, documented limits and a published price of $0.02 per million input tokens, and the v1.1 weights are public under Apache-2.0. The API is days old, the official Python SDK has no method for it, and the governing terms and privacy notice could not be read on 9 October 2026.
Before you call either
Microsoft-Decision-1
- Use OpenRouter's Decisions method, not an OpenAI chat-completions SDK. OpenRouter says chat completions SDKs will not work with this model
- On Foundry, send the request to the deployment's /providers/microsoft/v1/systemone path with a Microsoft Entra token for https://cognitiveservices.azure.com/.default, not an API key
- Take the deployment name from the Foundry quickstart before the first call. Microsoft says to confirm the route and authentication header, and the pages reviewed do not give the name
- Keep each request within OpenRouter's 32,768-token context and send only fixed options, since the model is not intended for open-ended generation
- Measure latency and calibration on your own labelled cases before relying on Microsoft's latency and 'nine times out of 10' statements
pplx-decider
- Send
Authorization: Bearer. A key inx-api-keyreturns 401 on this endpoint. - Set
modelon every request. A missing or unknown model returns 400, and the guide shows a-latestname rejected. - Resize images to 2,048 tiles of 32 by 32 pixels or fewer before sending. Larger images end in a 504 after about a minute.
- Check the HTTP status before parsing an error. 404 and 405 have empty bodies, 504 can be HTML, and
error.codechanges type. - For the weights, use the repository's
autojevcode. The card says default causal inference does not reproduce the evaluated setup.
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Microsoft-Decision-1 or pplx-decider?
pplx-decider scores 62.9 (B) on agent readiness against Microsoft-Decision-1's 39 (E), and leads in every scored category.
Which is cheaper for decision models, Microsoft-Decision-1 or pplx-decider?
Microsoft-Decision-1, at free against free for pplx-decider. These are the vendors' published prices for the job.
Do Microsoft-Decision-1 and pplx-decider need an API key?
Microsoft-Decision-1 takes an API key or an OAuth sign-in. pplx-decider needs an API key.
Can an agent call Microsoft-Decision-1 and pplx-decider without installing anything?
No hosted endpoint is listed for Microsoft-Decision-1. pplx-decider has a hosted endpoint at https://api.perplexity.ai/v1/decisions.
Other comparisons with Microsoft-Decision-1 or pplx-decider
- Celeris-1 Decision vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- Celeris-1 Decision vs pplx-decider
- Clef vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- Clef vs pplx-decider
- Laya vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- Laya vs pplx-decider
- Decider vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- Decider vs pplx-decider
- GLiClass vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- GLiClass vs pplx-decider
- Kev vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- Kev vs pplx-decider
- Liquid d1 vs Microsoft-Decision-1
- Liquid d1 vs pplx-decider
- Microsoft-Decision-1 vs Drex 1.5
- Microsoft-Decision-1 vs OpenAI Decisions API
- Microsoft-Decision-1 vs Strands Decider 2B
- Microsoft-Decision-1 vs Jev
- Microsoft-Decision-1 vs Vela 2.0
- Drex 1.5 vs pplx-decider
- OpenAI Decisions API vs pplx-decider
- pplx-decider vs Strands Decider 2B
- pplx-decider vs Jev
- pplx-decider vs Vela 2.0
Machine-readable
- This page as Markdown
/compare/microsoft-decision-1-vs-pplx-decider.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/microsoft-decision-1.json·/api/v1/tools/pplx-decider.json - From a terminal
anchor compare microsoft-decision-1 pplx-decider(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "microsoft-decision-1", "b": "pplx-decider"}at/mcp, no key