Model comparison

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite vs Gemma 2 9B

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.8 to 25.9 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 20 shared benchmarks.

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite Google

40.8

Rank #144 Confirmed

Gemma 2 9B Google

25.9

Rank #341 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 20 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite scores higher in 8 categories and Gemma 2 9B in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in knowledge, where Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads 41.9 to 9.7.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 80% for Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite and 0.6% for Gemma 2 9B.
  • Gemma 2 9B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite and Gemma 2 9B specifications
Gemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
ProviderGoogleGoogle
Noometry Index40.825.9
Released2026-03-032024-06-24
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M—
Max output66K—
Input $ / M tokens$0.25—
Output $ / M tokens$1.50—
Results tracked3835

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Category by category

Coding Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 37.8 (#188), Gemma 2 9B: 29.4 (#304)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Coding14001173
LMArena WebDev1256—
SciCode41.9%—
WeirdML52.2%—
BigCodeBench Instruct—34.7%
LiveBench Coding—22.5%
BigCodeBench Complete—40.6%
ALE-Bench797.73—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 30.2 (#79), Gemma 2 9B: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
DeepResearch Bench37.3%—

Reasoning Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 22.9 (#186), Gemma 2 9B: 15.9 (#309)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Hard Prompts14071171
Epoch Capabilities Index144.47119.83
Kagi LLM Benchmark67.2%—
NYT Connections (extended)8.2%—
CritPt1.1%—
Chess Puzzles25%—
EnigmaEval3%—
Thematic Generalization63.3%—
LiveBench Reasoning—15.2%
DTBench76.8%—
LiveBench Data Analysis—36.4%
LMCA35%—
ForecastBench54.4—
LiveBench—28.7%
PIQA—83.7%

Math Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 40.7 (#90), Gemma 2 9B: 9.9 (#318)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202580%0.6%
LMArena Math14281183
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)27.7%—
LiveBench Math—19.8%
MATH Level 5—21%
GSM8K—84.9%

Knowledge Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 41.9 (#104), Gemma 2 9B: 9.7 (#305)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
GPQA Diamond81.8%27.5%
LMArena Expert13981147
Humanity's Last Exam8.6%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate8.2%—
BoolQ—85.7%
MMLU—72.1%

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 39.4 (#60), Gemma 2 9B: —

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Vision1240—

Multilingual Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 52.3 (#86), Gemma 2 9B: 36.6 (#238)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Non-English14111188
LMArena Chinese14611185
LMArena French14241190
LMArena German14291186
LMArena Japanese14131144
LMArena Korean13921137
LMArena Russian14201200
LMArena Spanish14211200

Instruction Following Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 72.7 (#131), Gemma 2 9B: 57.6 (#269)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Instruction Following13771178
LiveBench Instruction Following—52.6%

Long Context Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 42.5 (#122), Gemma 2 9B: 36.3 (#233)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Longer Query13941197

Writing & Preference Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 60.9 (#94), Gemma 2 9B: 32.1 (#281)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.1 Flash LiteGemma 2 9B
LMArena Text14161207
LMArena Creative Writing14011206
LMArena Multi-Turn14171193
EQ-Bench Creative Writing—841
LiveBench Language—25.5%

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite better than Gemma 2 9B?

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.8 to 25.9 on the Noometry Index.

Is Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite or Gemma 2 9B better for coding?

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 37.8 versus 29.4 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite and Gemma 2 9B share?

20 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite has 38 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 2 9B has 35.

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