OpenAI is rolling out a pair of new artificial intelligence models that mimic the process of human reasoning to field more complicated coding questions and visual tasks, the latest in a flurry of releases from the company to fend off renewed competition in the US and China.

OpenAI has released two AI “reasoning” models that it says are its most capable yet as well as an open-source AI agent that helps computer programmers code, as the company seeks to gain a lead over its rivals. The open-source coding agent, called Codex CLI, marks the first time since 2019 that OpenAI has introduced a significant open-source tool.

OpenAI on Wednesday announced new reasoning AI models, o3 and o4-mini which can pause and work through questions before responding.