AI video model leaderboard · September 2026
AI video model leaderboard — September 2026.
One prompt, sent through every frontier video model King AI hosts, and then ranked by what a credit actually buys. The measured rows come straight out of the app's billing catalog; the judgement calls are labelled as judgement calls.
Winners
What won, and how we know.
Five rows are measured — computed from the app's billing catalog when this page was built, across every one of the 37 enabled text-to-video models, and re-checked before it was written. Four are the King AI team's picks, labelled as such. Nothing here is a vendor's own claim.
| Category | Winner | Basis | Why |
|---|---|---|---|
| Price / value | MiniMax H3 | Measured | 0.6 credits a second (~$0.24) is the lowest rate of any of the 37 enabled text-to-video models in the catalog that generates its own soundtrack — every tier, not just the flagship shelf. It renders at 768p. |
| Cheapest 1080p | Kling O3 Standard | Measured | 1.12 credits a second (~$0.45) at 1080p — the lowest per-second rate of any enabled text-to-video engine that reaches 1080p or better. PixVerse V6 is next at 1.15. |
| Longest single take | WAN 3.0 | Measured | 30 seconds in one generation, the longest any enabled text-to-video engine offers. Seedance 2.5, WAN 3.0 Prime 1080p, WAN 3.0 1080p and WAN 3.0 Prime reach the same ceiling; WAN 3.0 is the cheapest of them, at 1 credit a second. |
| Effects | Vidu | Measured | 90 of the app’s 200 one-tap effect templates run on Vidu — more than PixVerse (76) or Kling (34). |
| Native audio | Veo 3.1 | Measured | Sound comes out of the model in the same pass as the picture, not from a library. Veo 3.1 carries hasAudioSupport in catalog v90 — asserted at build — and so do 36 of the 37 enabled text-to-video models (Luma Ray 3.2 is the only silent one), which is why all eight takes below ship with a native track. |
| Cinematic realism | Veo 3.1 | Editors’ pick | Held highlights, believable water and the steadiest camera of the eight on this plate. A judgement, not a measurement — see the method below. |
| Human motion | Kling V3 Pro | Editors’ pick | Bodies and limbs keep their mass through a turn instead of sliding, and hands survive the shot. Our call, on the eight takes above. |
| Storytelling | Seedance 2.0 | Editors’ pick | Reads a long prompt as a sequence rather than one frozen tableau, so the beats arrive in the order you wrote them. |
| Image-to-video | Kling V3 Pro | Editors’ pick | Keeps a still’s framing, palette and faces intact while it moves them, which is the whole job when you start from your own photo. |
Measured rows read catalog v90. Rates are credits per second of finished video; the dollar figures convert at $0.40 a credit.
Compare
Two engines. One prompt.
Pick any two of the eight takes. Same starting frame, same prompt, same settings — the only thing that changes is the model and what it costs.
Kling V3 Pro
- Max resolution
- 1080p
- Clip length
- 8s
- This clip
- 13.44 (~$5.38)
- Credits per second
- 1.68 (~$0.67)
- Native audio
- Yes
Veo 3.1
- Max resolution
- 1080p
- Clip length
- 8s
- This clip
- 32 (~$12.80)
- Credits per second
- 4 (~$1.60)
- Native audio
- Yes
A paper boat the size of a ship sails through a flooded cathedral at dawn, candle flames guttering as it passes, water lapping the stone, slow lateral dolly, 35mm, natural light, the sound of water and wind, continuous motion, no cuts, no new objects
All eight takes
Every engine, side by side.
The full field, with the exact clip each one rendered and what that clip was billed at. These are image-to-video runs from the shared still above.
| Engine | Max resolution | Clip length | Audio | Credits per second | This clip |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Veo 3.1 | 1080p | 8s | Yes | 4 (~$1.60) | 32 (~$12.80) |
| Sora 2 Pro | Not stated | 8s | Yes | 5 (~$2.00) | 40 (~$16.00) |
| Kling O3 Pro | 1080p | 8s | Yes | 1.4 (~$0.56) | 11.2 (~$4.48) |
| Kling V3 Pro | 1080p | 8s | Yes | 1.68 (~$0.67) | 13.44 (~$5.38) |
| Seedance 2.0 | 1080p | 8s | Yes | 6.804 (~$2.72) | 54.43 (~$21.77) |
| WAN 3.0 1080p | 1080p | 8s | Yes | 2 (~$0.80) | 16 (~$6.40) |
| MiniMax H3 2K | 2K | 10s | Yes | 1.3 (~$0.52) | 13 (~$5.20) |
| LTX 2.5 Pro | 1080p | 8s | Yes | 1.7 (~$0.68) | 13.6 (~$5.44) |
Sora 2 Pro’s maximum resolution is left blank on purpose. The app bills it at 5 credits a second, the rate of the legacy 1080p tier, and the tier is still unsettled — so this page states no figure it cannot stand behind.
Method
How this page was made.
Every take on this page started from the same 16:9 still and the same prompt string, printed verbatim above. Nothing was re-rolled to flatter an engine, no prompt was tuned per model, and no clip was graded, trimmed or upscaled afterwards. Where an engine could run the shared length it did; MiniMax H3 offers 5, 10 and 15 seconds rather than 8, so its take runs 10 seconds and the table says so. The clip length in each row is the length that was actually generated and billed.
The prices are not estimates. They are read out of fal_models_fallback.json — the same catalog the app bills from, at version 90 — when this page is generated, and the arithmetic is the app's: rate per second multiplied by the seconds you asked for. A credit is worth $0.40 at the a-la-carte pack rate — the same rate on all four credit packs — which is where every dollar figure on this page comes from. Those figures therefore state the most a generation can cost: a subscriber pays less per credit. They are conversions for orientation, not a second price list. The app charges in credits.
The measured rows range over every enabled text-to-video model in the catalog — 37 of them today, across every tier — rather than a shortlist or the one shelf the app calls its flagship. A tier is a merchandising decision; it is not a fact about what something costs, and ranking inside one is how a page ends up crowning a model that a cheaper model beats. They are recomputed on every build and re-asserted before the file is written, so a catalog change that would falsify one of them breaks the build instead of shipping. That includes the resolution ranking: a maximum resolution this page has never seen fails loudly rather than sorting itself to the bottom of the list.
The editors' picks are exactly that — the King AI team's reading of the eight takes, re-run and re-argued every month. They are the honest part of a leaderboard that a number cannot settle: whether water looks like water, whether a body carries its own weight through a turn, whether a long prompt arrives as a sequence or as one frozen tableau. We label them so you can discount them if you disagree, and the takes are right there for you to judge yourself.
One last thing worth saying plainly, because most comparison pages exist to sell you a tier: every engine on this table is available on every plan, including the free one. There is no model behind a higher tier, no watermark, and no queue that a paid account jumps. A signed-in free account gets 3 credits a day, which is enough to run the cheapest engines here today and decide for yourself.
FAQ
Leaderboard questions.
How is the King AI leaderboard made?
Two ways, and the table says which is which. The measured rows are computed from the app's own model catalog (v90) when this page is built: the per-second credit rate, the resolution ceiling, the longest clip an engine offers, and the number of enabled effect templates per provider. If the catalog moves, the build fails rather than publishing a stale winner. The editors' picks are judgements made by the King AI team on the eight takes on this page — same prompt, same starting frame, same settings — and they are labelled as picks everywhere they appear.
Which AI video model is cheapest?
Across all 37 enabled text-to-video models, MiniMax H3 is the lowest at 0.6 credits a second (~$0.24) — with its own audio, at 768p. If you need 1080p or better, Kling O3 Standard is the cheapest route in at 1.12 credits a second (~$0.45). Credits are charged per second of finished video, so a short clip on an expensive engine can cost less than a long one on a cheap engine.
Which AI video models generate their own audio?
36 of the 37 enabled text-to-video models — all but Luma Ray 3.2 — are marked audio-capable in the catalog, and every one of the eight takes on this page ships with a native track. Audio is generated in the same pass as the picture; nothing is dubbed on afterwards, and there is no separate charge for it.
Can I run this prompt myself?
Yes, and that is the point of the page. Every engine name and every button here opens the King AI studio with that model already selected and this prompt already typed. Signed-in free accounts get 3 credits a day, so the cheapest engines on this table are runnable without paying anything; the app shows you the exact credit cost before you press generate.
How often does the leaderboard update?
The measured rows are regenerated from the catalog every time the site is built, so they are never older than the last deploy. The editors' picks and the eight takes are re-run monthly — this edition is September 2026.
Keep reading
Where to go next.
Every model in the app
The full roster, with the specs, the limits and the price of each one.
ExploreSora vs Veo vs Kling
The three names everyone asks about, on one prompt and one price list.
ExploreWhat a credit costs
Plans, packs and the free daily grant — and what each buys on this table.
ExploreYour turn
Run the same prompt yourself.
The studio opens with this prompt already in the box. Pick any engine on the table, watch the credit cost update before you commit, and see whether you agree with us.