Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite vs o3 Mini
o3 Mini leads Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, 12.5 to 10.4, and Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite costs 11.0x less per output token ($0.40 vs $4.40 per million). Updated October 21, 2026; 21 benchmarks have a result for both.
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite or o3 Mini: which to pick
Neither model has a coding score yet, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite for output tokens 11.0x cheaper ($0.40 vs $4.40 per million) and a larger context window (1.05M against 200K tokens).
- Shared results
- 21
- Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite only
- 9
- o3 Mini only
- 50
- Like-for-like categories
- 7 of 9
Only benchmarks that tested both models count toward a pick; a result only one model has is shown but not compared.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, six public coding benchmarks
No call
Neither has a coding score yet.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
o3 Mini
o3 Mini leads, 12.5 against 10.4.
Same board, both measured
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
o3 Mini
o3 Mini leads, 75.5% against 70.2%.
Same board, both measured
Math
AIME
o3 Mini
o3 Mini leads, 86.5% against 42.1%.
Same board, both measured
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite leads, 79.1% against 78.7%.
Same board, both measured
Long documents
Listed context window
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite takes 1.05M tokens against 200K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite $0.0003, o3 Mini $0.0033 per turn.
List prices
At a glance
- Coding index
- Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite not benchmarked, o3 Mini not benchmarked.
- Widest category
- Math, 23.1 points apart on average over 2 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- AIME: Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite 42.1% against o3 Mini 86.5%, 44.4 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite $0.40 against o3 Mini $4.40 per million output tokens, 11.0x apart.
- Context window
- Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite takes 1.05M tokens, o3 Mini 200K.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | Bars | o3 Mini | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 0 | 3 | ||
| Intelligence | 0 | 2 | ||
| Agentic work | 0 | 1 | ||
| Reasoning | 0 | 3 | ||
| Math | 0 | 2 | ||
| Knowledge | 3 | 3 | ||
| General | 1 | 3 | ||
| All shared boards | 4 | 17 |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index03
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aider polyglot | Not measured | 60.4% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| SWE-bench Verified | Not measured | 42.4% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| SWE-bench Lite | Not measured | 32.3% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 71.4% | 71.5% | o3 Mini |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | 59.3% | 73.4% | o3 Mini |
| SciCode | Not measured | 42.8% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | 4.5% | 6.8% | o3 Mini |
| GSO-Bench | Not measured | 1.3% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| WeirdML | Not measured | 43.7% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Cybench | Not measured | 22.5% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | Not measured | 1378 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | Not measured | 1364 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| SciCode | Not measured | 7.7% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 26 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index02
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 10.4 | 12.5 | o3 Mini |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 133.8 | 140.2 | o3 Mini |
Agentic workLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index01
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| τ²-Bench Telecom | 19.0% | 31.3% | o3 Mini |
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) | 36.9% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 39 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index03
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 70.2% | 75.5% | o3 Mini |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 75.4% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 62.5% | 77.3% | o3 Mini |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 6.8% | 12.0% | o3 Mini |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | Not measured | 77.0% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| ARC-AGI | Not measured | 34.5% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | Not measured | 3.0% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| SimpleBench | Not measured | 22.8% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Chess puzzles | Not measured | 15.0% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | Not measured | 7.0% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | Not measured | 1365 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: expert | Not measured | 1364 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | Not measured | 1375 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 40.5% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 8 boards here | |||
MathLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index02
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | 42.1% | 86.5% | o3 Mini |
| MATH 500 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 91.8% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | 89.5% | 91.3% | o3 Mini |
| AA Math Index | 53.3 | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | 53.3% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | Not measured | 76.9% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | Not measured | 18.6% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | Not measured | 0.0% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| MATH level 5 | Not measured | 96.5% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: math | Not measured | 1396 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | Not measured | 1399 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 2 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index33
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 79.1% | 78.7% | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 82.0% | 71.5% | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 57.6% | 45.3% | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 66.2% | 69.4% | o3 Mini |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 57.6% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | 88.9% | 94.8% | o3 Mini |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 34.2% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | 75.9% | 80.2% | o3 Mini |
| SimpleQA Verified | Not measured | 15.3% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: science | Not measured | 1339 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | Not measured | 1330 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | Not measured | 1328 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | Not measured | 1313 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
Web designNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 9 boards here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index13
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 30.8% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 75.8% | Not measured | Only Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite measured |
| IFBench | 49.9% | 67.1% | o3 Mini |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 55.7% | 43.0% | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite |
| DTBench | 62.8% | 68.8% | o3 Mini |
| LMCA | 18.1% | 19.0% | o3 Mini |
| Fiction.LiveBench | Not measured | 50.0% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Creative writing (Lech Mazur) | Not measured | 61.7% | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text | Not measured | 1337 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | Not measured | 1337 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | Not measured | 1286 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: English | Not measured | 1351 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: non-English | Not measured | 1319 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | Not measured | 1379 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: German | Not measured | 1303 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | Not measured | 1286 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | Not measured | 1313 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: French | Not measured | 1334 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | Not measured | 1321 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | Not measured | 1304 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: Polish | Not measured | 1294 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | Not measured | 1320 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | Not measured | 1343 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | Not measured | 1313 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | Not measured | 1283 | Only o3 Mini measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 21 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | o3 Mini | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | Google Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite | OpenAI o3 Mini |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | OpenAI | |
| Weights | No public weights listed | No public weights listed |
| Released | July 22, 2025 | January 31, 2025 |
| Context window | 1.05M | 200K |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.10 | $1.10 |
| Output $/Mtok | $0.40 | $4.40 |
| Coding index | Not benchmarked | Not benchmarked |
| Independent measurements behind it | 0 | 0 |
| Cost per solved task | Not computable | Not computable |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite better than o3 Mini for coding?
Neither model has a coding score yet, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite for output tokens 11.0x cheaper ($0.40 vs $4.40 per million) and a larger context window (1.05M against 200K tokens).
Which is cheaper, Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite or o3 Mini?
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite costs $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.40 per million output tokens; o3 Mini costs $1.10 and $4.40. Cost per solved task is known for neither of them.
Which has the bigger context window, Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite or o3 Mini?
Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite, with 1.05M tokens against 200K.
How many benchmarks is the Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite vs o3 Mini comparison based on?
21 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 21, 2026. Gemini 2.5 Flash Lite's coding index rests on 0 independent benchmarks and o3 Mini's on 0. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.