Model comparison

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite vs Gemma 3 12B

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.5 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 11× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 11, 2026. 21 shared benchmarks.

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite

Google

41.5

Rank #133 Confirmed

Gemma 3 12B

Google

32.1

Rank #262 Confirmed

Summary

They share 21 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite scores higher in 9 categories and Gemma 3 12B in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in knowledge, where Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads 50.1 to 26.5.
The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 71.1% for Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite and 16.7% for Gemma 3 12B.
Gemma 3 12B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $2.50 for Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite.
Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 131K.
Gemma 3 12B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite and Gemma 3 12B specifications
	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
Provider	Google	Google
Noometry Index	41.5	32.1
Released	2026-07-21	2025-03-12
Weights	Proprietary	Open
Context window	1.05M	131K
Max output	66K	8K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.30	$0.05
Output $ / M tokens	$2.50	$0.15
Results tracked	39	24

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Category by category

Coding Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 42.4 (#104), Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
SciCode	41.3%	17.4%
LMArena Coding	1453	1281
LMArena WebDev	1440	—
WeirdML	39%	—
ALE-Bench	765.27	—

Agentic & Tool Use Too close to call

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 25.7 (#107), Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
APEX-Agents	29.3%	—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard	—	30.4%
GDP.pdf	10%	—

Reasoning Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 27.8 (#114), Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
CritPt	0%	0%
Chess Puzzles	22%	0%
LMArena Hard Prompts	1441	1309
DTBench	83.5%	48.8%
LMCA	37.6%	4.5%
Epoch Capabilities Index	145.13	123.5
ARC-AGI-2	10.3%	—
NYT Connections (extended)	60.4%	—
ARC-AGI-1	53.5%	—
Mystery Game Puzzles	19%	—

Math Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 25.9 (#264), Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	71.1%	16.7%
LMArena Math	1433	1307
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)	26%	—
FrontierMath Tier 4	0%	—
ProofBench	13%	—

Knowledge Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 50.1 (#72), Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
GPQA Diamond	83.3%	39.5%
LMArena Expert	1435	1248
Vectara Hallucination Rate	—	4.4%

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 41.1 (#40), Gemma 3 12B: —

Multimodal benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Vision	1268	—
MindCube	—	46.7%

Multilingual Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 53.5 (#63), Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Non-English	1427	1318
LMArena German	1454	1370
LMArena Russian	1443	1335
LMArena Chinese	1469	—
LMArena French	1451	—
LMArena Japanese	1427	—
LMArena Korean	1407	—
LMArena Spanish	1442	—

Instruction Following Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 74.8 (#85), Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Instruction Following	1420	1299

Long Context Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 43.9 (#84), Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Longer Query	1435	1317

Writing & Preference Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite: 64.2 (#57), Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite	Gemma 3 12B
LMArena Text	1435	1334
LMArena Creative Writing	1420	1331
EQ-Bench Creative Writing	1559	1126
LMArena Multi-Turn	1445	1334

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite better than Gemma 3 12B?

Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite 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; Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite lists at $0.30 and $2.50.

Is Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite or Gemma 3 12B better for coding?

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 42.4 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite does, with 1.05M tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite and Gemma 3 12B share?

21 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite has 39 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 3 12B has 24.