For the novel projects I'm working on, Astra did unblock me where I was stuck with GPT 5.6 Sol, which in itself gives it value for myself, but outside of that it's not a significant improvement if at all. I have noticed Astra is more efficient so for my use case it may not be 2.5x cost.
I use to want to use the best model because I wanted the highest quality output but they all produce that now. If you are trying to understand an ancient language humans don't or solve a math mystery or fixing old undocumented firmware maybe. If you are trying to create a react app or backend I wouldn't bother.
The rule of thumb is if Stack overflow could answer your question don't bother with Astra or Sol.
You've reached the end!
speedgoose•1d ago