Noometry

Model comparison

Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Gemma 3 12B

Claude Sonnet 5.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.9 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 53× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5.5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 16 shared benchmarks.

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Anthropic

61.9

Rank #10 Confirmed

Gemma 3 12B Google

32.1

Rank #262 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 16 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher in 9 categories and Gemma 3 12B in 0 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads 87.9 to 22.3.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 100% for Claude Sonnet 5.5 and 16.7% for Gemma 3 12B.
  • Gemma 3 12B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $10 for Claude Sonnet 5.5.
  • Claude Sonnet 5.5 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 131K.
  • Gemma 3 12B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Claude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
ProviderAnthropicGoogle
Noometry Index61.932.1
Released2026-09-282025-03-12
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1M131K
Max output128K8K
Input $ / M tokens$2$0.05
Output $ / M tokens$10$0.15
Results tracked3224

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Category by category

Coding Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 67.3 (#6), Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
SciCode61%17.4%
LMArena Coding15131281
FrontierCode52.1%—
CursorBench55.5%—
LMArena WebDev1774—
FrontierSWE61.9%—
ALE-Bench1,819—

Agentic & Tool Use Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 45.0 (#16), Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
APEX-Agents75.5%—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard—30.4%

Reasoning Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 54.0 (#28), Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
CritPt31.4%0%
LMArena Hard Prompts14951309
Epoch Capabilities Index165.03123.5
NYT Connections (extended)80.5%—
Chess Puzzles—0%
Mystery Game Puzzles65%—
DTBench—48.8%
LMCA—4.5%

Math Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 87.9 (#6), Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025100%16.7%
LMArena Math15101307
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)88.8%—
FrontierMath Tier 480.5%—
ProofBench100%—
FrontierMath Erdős2.9%—

Knowledge Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 66.0 (#12), Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
GPQA Diamond95.6%39.5%
LMArena Expert15401248
SimpleQA Verified46.5%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate—4.4%

Multimodal Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 51.5 (#6), Gemma 3 12B: —

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Vision1289—
Furniture Assembly75%—
MindCube—46.7%

Multilingual Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 55.3 (#30), Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Non-English14521318
LMArena Russian14511335
LMArena Chinese1522—
LMArena German—1370

Instruction Following Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 78.3 (#11), Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Instruction Following14951299

Long Context Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 45.9 (#28), Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Longer Query14981317

Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 66.0 (#40), Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Text14711334
LMArena Creative Writing14651331
LMArena Multi-Turn14741334
EQ-Bench Creative Writing—1126

Frequently asked questions

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 better than Gemma 3 12B?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.9 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 53× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5.5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Gemma 3 12B?

Gemma 3 12B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.15 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 5.5 lists at $2 and $10.

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Gemma 3 12B better for coding?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 67.3 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 does, with 1M tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 5.5 and Gemma 3 12B share?

16 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 5.5 has 32 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 3 12B has 24.

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