Creators

Sora Is Gone. Here Are the Best AI Video Generators to Use Instead

OpenAI shut the Sora app in April and the API on September 24, 2026. Here's where creators and businesses should move, ranked.

By The AI Standings Desk · · 3 min read

In this guide
  1. The quick answer
  2. 1. Gemini Omni 1.1 Flash: the new leaderboard king
  3. 2. Veo 3.1: the safe, do-everything pick
  4. 3. Kling 3.0: the best bang for your buck
  5. 4. Seedance 2.5: for realistic people
  6. 5. Runway Gen-4.5: for people who edit
  7. Moving off Sora: a 4-step checklist
  8. The bottom line

It's official: OpenAI's Sora API shut down on September 24, 2026. The consumer Sora app already closed on April 26. If you built a workflow, a side business or an app on Sora, you need somewhere new to go this week.

The good news is that the rest of the field has caught up, and in several ways moved past where Sora ever was. Here's where to move, depending on what you make.

The quick answer

If you need…UseWhy
The best quality right nowGemini Omni 1.1 Flash#1 on the LMArena text-to-video leaderboard
Safe, polished commercial videoVeo 3.1Native audio, 4K, landscape and portrait
The best value per secondKling 3.0 TurboAbout $0.11–$0.14/sec, with multi-shot storyboards
Realistic people for socialSeedance 2.5A creator favourite for human motion
Precise camera controlRunway Gen-4.5Still the professionals' editing suite

1. Gemini Omni 1.1 Flash: the new leaderboard king

Google's "omni" model, which handles text, images, audio and video in one system, now sits #1 on LMArena's text-to-video leaderboard, just ahead of the original Gemini Omni Flash. That's a notable shift: a general-purpose model beating the dedicated video specialists.

Caveat: it has fewer community votes than older models, so its score may still move. Check our weekly video rankings to see where it settles.

2. Veo 3.1: the safe, do-everything pick

If you're making video for a brand or a client, Veo 3.1 is still the most widely available, brand-safe option from a Western provider. It generates sound natively (dialogue, effects and ambience), outputs 4K, and follows prompts closely in both landscape and portrait.

GoogleVeo 3.1Video model · Not published

3. Kling 3.0: the best bang for your buck

Kling 3.0 Turbo costs roughly 11 to 14 cents per second of video. It matches the leaders on cinematic lighting and on hard motion like hair, liquids and fabric. Its standout feature is a multi-shot storyboard mode: you describe several shots and it keeps the characters consistent, with the audio synced across the cuts.

4. Seedance 2.5: for realistic people

ByteDance's Seedance, available through its Dreamina app, has two versions in the text-to-video top 7. Creators like it for natural human movement, which is still where many models fall into the uncanny valley.

5. Runway Gen-4.5: for people who edit

Runway isn't at the top of the leaderboard for raw generation. But filmmakers keep choosing it because camera control and the editing workflow matter more than a leaderboard screenshot when you're making something real.

Moving off Sora: a 4-step checklist

  1. Export everything. Download any Sora generations and prompts you still have access to.
  2. Rewrite your prompts. Each model reads prompts differently. Veo likes film-language descriptions ("35mm, shallow depth of field, slow dolly in"). Kling responds well to shot-by-shot storyboards.
  3. Test the same three prompts on two or three tools before you commit to a subscription.
  4. Check the licensing. Commercial-use rights differ by tool and by plan, especially on free tiers.

The bottom line

Sora's exit leaves no real gap. Veo 3.1 is the safe default, Kling 3.0 is the value play, and Gemini Omni is the one to watch. See the full, weekly-updated order in our video generation standings.

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