---
id: "openai-reasoning-best-practices"
title: "Reasoning best practices"
creator: "OpenAI"
url: "https://developers.openai.com/api/docs/guides/reasoning-best-practices"
level: "intermediate"
category: "prompting"
models: ["openai-reasoning-models"]
source_date: null
date_added: "2026-10-18"
---

[Prompting](/prompting/index.md)

# Reasoning best practices

by OpenAI

[Read the original →](https://developers.openai.com/api/docs/guides/reasoning-best-practices)

When to pick a reasoning model and how prompting them differs from chat models.

OpenAI explains situations where reasoning models are useful and how to give them suitable tasks. It is a helpful comparison point before reusing a prompt designed for a different model family.

Level: [Intermediate](/levels/index.md#intermediate)
Models: openai-reasoning-models
Category: [Prompting](/prompting/index.md)
Tags: [reasoning](/tags/reasoning/index.md)
Source date: date not stated
Added: 2026-10-18
Last verified: 2026-10-18
Status: ok

Summary in our own words. All rights with the original creator. Correction or removal: DM on X.