The closest alternative to KAT-Coder-Air V2.5 is KAT-Coder-Pro V2.5 — comparable intelligence (— vs —); for a cheaper option, Hy3 runs $0.140/M vs $0.150/M; for more speed, Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite hits 193 t/s; and the best open-weight substitute is GLM 5.2.
KAT-Coder-Pro V2.5 is the closest alternative to KAT-Coder-Air V2.5, with an Intelligence Index of — (KAT-Coder-Air V2.5 scores —) at $0.740 per million input tokens.
Yes — Hy3 costs $0.140 per million input tokens versus $0.150 for KAT-Coder-Air V2.5, while staying within ~8 points of its Intelligence Index.
GLM 5.2 is the strongest open-weight alternative to KAT-Coder-Air V2.5 — downloadable from Hugging Face and self-hostable, scoring 51.1 on intelligence.