Kimi K3 vs MiniMax M2.1
Kimi K3 leads MiniMax M2.1 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, 43.6 to 20.9, and MiniMax M2.1 costs 12.5x less per output token ($1.20 vs $15.00 per million). Updated October 22, 2026; 21 benchmarks have a result for both.
Kimi K3 or MiniMax M2.1: which to pick
Only Kimi K3 has a coding score, 62.3 on the Vibe Coding Index; MiniMax M2.1 has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick MiniMax M2.1 for output tokens 12.5x cheaper ($1.20 vs $15.00 per million) and a lower cost per solved task ($0.59 against $0.81).
- Shared results
- 21
- Kimi K3 only
- 96
- MiniMax M2.1 only
- 13
- Like-for-like categories
- 6 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
Only Kimi K3 has a coding score, so no call is made.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
Kimi K3
Kimi K3 leads, 43.6 against 20.9.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only Kimi K3 has a AA Agentic Index result, 50.0.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
Kimi K3
Kimi K3 leads, 92.9% against 78.5%.
Same board, both measured
Math
AIME
No call
Only MiniMax M2.1 has a AIME result, 77.9%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
Kimi K3
Kimi K3 leads, 88.0% against 87.0%.
Same board, both measured
Web design
Design Arena: websites
Kimi K3
Kimi K3 leads, 1334 against 1201.
Same board, both measured
General
Vals Index
No call
Only Kimi K3 has a Vals Index result, 53.0%.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Kimi K3
Kimi K3 takes 1.05M tokens against 205K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
MiniMax M2.1
Kimi K3 $0.011, MiniMax M2.1 $0.0009 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
MiniMax M2.1
Kimi K3 $0.81, MiniMax M2.1 $0.59.
Published attempt cost and pass rate
At a glance
- Coding index
- Kimi K3 62.3 from 6 benchmarks, MiniMax M2.1 not benchmarked.
- Widest category
- Intelligence, 22.7 points apart on average over 1 shared benchmark.
- Widest single gap
- ALE-Bench: Kimi K3 1524.5 against MiniMax M2.1 623.8, 30.0 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Kimi K3 $15.00 against MiniMax M2.1 $1.20 per million output tokens, 12.5x apart.
- Context window
- Kimi K3 takes 1.05M tokens, MiniMax M2.1 205K.
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 | Kimi K3 | Bars | MiniMax M2.1 | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 3 | 0 | ||
| Intelligence | 1 | 0 | ||
| Reasoning | 3 | 0 | ||
| Knowledge | 5 | 0 | ||
| Web design | 7 | 0 | ||
| General | 2 | 0 | ||
| All shared boards | 21 | 0 |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index30
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench coding | 59.3% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1655 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| AA Coding Index | 76.2 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 87.2% | 81.8% | Kimi K3 |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 93.4% | 74.8% | Kimi K3 |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | 17.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 85.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | 16.1% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | 2.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| IOI (Vals AI) | 48.9% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | 80.9% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| SWE-bench Multimodal (Vals AI) | 44.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Vibe Code Bench 1-100 (Vals AI) | 18.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | 75.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 81.0% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| SciCode | 59.5% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 28.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| Terminal-Bench | Not measured | 36.6% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| FrontierCode | 44.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| FrontierSWE | 25.9% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| WeirdML | 82.6% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| ALE-Bench | 1524.5 | 623.8 | Kimi K3 |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1508 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1499 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1670 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1644 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: from an image | 1579 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 12 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 43.6 | 20.9 | Kimi K3 |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 157.9 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index25 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 50.0 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building web apps | 1295 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building full-stack apps | 1315 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building mobile apps | 1269 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building Android apps | 1253 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building Godot games | 1223 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: agents building games | 1252 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: HTML slides | 1206 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: PowerPoint slides | 1247 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Design Arena: spreadsheets | 1070 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LiveBench research | 79.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LiveBench browser | 16.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LiveBench long agentic | 42.8% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | 53.1% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | 33.4% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | 46.1% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark (Vals AI) | 12.9% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | 66.7% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| BioMysteryBench (Vals AI) | 72.6% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Terminal-Bench-Science (Vals AI) | 1.4% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Time Horizon Index (Vals AI) | 10.5% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | Not measured | 85.4% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| APEX-Agents | 47.8% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| PostTrainBench | 32.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | $5,165 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 16 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index30
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 92.9% | 78.5% | Kimi K3 |
| LiveBench reasoning | 90.7% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 88.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 93.5% | 83.0% | Kimi K3 |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 46.9% | 23.2% | Kimi K3 |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | 93.1% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| ARC-AGI | 94.5% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 60.4% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| SimpleBench | 60.7% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Chess puzzles | 37.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | 26.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1495 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1520 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1496 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 8 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index11 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | Not measured | 77.9% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| MATH 500 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 89.0% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | Not measured | 87.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| AA Math Index | Not measured | 82.7 | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 82.7% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | 97.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | 72.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | 39.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| ProofBench | 87.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1494 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1505 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 2 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index50
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 88.0% | 87.0% | Kimi K3 |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 86.2% | 75.5% | Kimi K3 |
| CaseLaw (Vals AI) | Not measured | 55.8% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 71.6% | 58.9% | Kimi K3 |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 75.7% | 66.3% | Kimi K3 |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 66.3% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | Not measured | 91.2% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 49.4% | 34.1% | Kimi K3 |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 87.5% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | 50.6% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1508 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1489 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1503 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1470 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 4 boards here | |||
Web designLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index70
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1334 | 1201 | Kimi K3 |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1341 | 1220 | Kimi K3 |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1358 | 1134 | Kimi K3 |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1351 | 1206 | Kimi K3 |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1387 | 1164 | Kimi K3 |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1360 | 1190 | Kimi K3 |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1302 | 1131 | Kimi K3 |
| LiveBench design | 77.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 1 board here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index20
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vals Index | 53.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LiveBench data analysis | 78.7% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | 68.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 52.8% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 88.0% | 80.8% | Kimi K3 |
| Vals Multimodal Index | 73.4% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| IFBench | Not measured | 69.9% | Only MiniMax M2.1 measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 88.7% | 67.7% | Kimi K3 |
| DTBench | 91.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMCA | 52.7% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 95.0% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Furniture assembly | 34.2% | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text | 1476 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1485 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1457 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: English | 1481 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1466 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1529 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: German | 1490 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1494 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1460 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: French | 1492 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1472 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1485 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1458 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1489 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1494 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1471 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1453 | Not measured | Only Kimi K3 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 17 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 | 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
MiniMax M2.1 costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
MiniMax M2.1 costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
MiniMax M2.1 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 | MoonshotAI Kimi K3 | MiniMax M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Moonshot AI | MiniMax |
| Weights | Open weights | Open weights |
| Released | July 16, 2026 | December 23, 2025 |
| Context window | 1.05M | 205K |
| Input $/Mtok | $3.00 | $0.30 |
| Output $/Mtok | $15.00 | $1.20 |
| Coding index | 62.3 | Not benchmarked |
| Independent measurements behind it | 6 | 1 |
| Cost per solved task | $0.81 | $0.59 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Kimi K3 better than MiniMax M2.1 for coding?
Only Kimi K3 has a coding score, 62.3 on the Vibe Coding Index; MiniMax M2.1 has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick MiniMax M2.1 for output tokens 12.5x cheaper ($1.20 vs $15.00 per million) and a lower cost per solved task ($0.59 against $0.81).
Which is cheaper, Kimi K3 or MiniMax M2.1?
Kimi K3 costs $3.00 per million input tokens and $15.00 per million output tokens; MiniMax M2.1 costs $0.30 and $1.20. Per solved SWE-bench Verified task, Kimi K3 costs $0.81 and MiniMax M2.1 $0.59.
Which has the bigger context window, Kimi K3 or MiniMax M2.1?
Kimi K3, with 1.05M tokens against 205K.
How many benchmarks is the Kimi K3 vs MiniMax M2.1 comparison based on?
21 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 22, 2026. Kimi K3's coding index rests on 6 independent benchmarks and MiniMax M2.1's on 1. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.