Model comparison

Gemini 3.5 Flash vs MiniMax-M2.5

Gemini 3.5 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.2 to 38.3 on the Noometry Index. MiniMax-M2.5 costs 6.4× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.5 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 25 shared benchmarks.

Gemini 3.5 Flash Google

54.2

Rank #32 Confirmed

MiniMax-M2.5 MiniMax

38.3

Rank #188 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 25 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3.5 Flash scores higher in 8 categories and MiniMax-M2.5 in 1 category; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Gemini 3.5 Flash leads 62.8 to 17.5.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is NYT Connections (extended): 92.6% for Gemini 3.5 Flash and 16.8% for MiniMax-M2.5.
  • MiniMax-M2.5 is cheaper at $0.30 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $1.50 / $9 for Gemini 3.5 Flash.
  • Gemini 3.5 Flash accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 205K.
  • MiniMax-M2.5 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Gemini 3.5 Flash and MiniMax-M2.5 specifications
Gemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
ProviderGoogleMiniMax
Noometry Index54.238.3
Released2026-05-192026-02-12
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M205K
Max output66K131K
Input $ / M tokens$1.50$0.30
Output $ / M tokens$9$1.20
Results tracked5433

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Category by category

Coding Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 49.4 (#49), MiniMax-M2.5: 48.1 (#58)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena WebDev14991387
LMArena Coding14921381
ALE-Bench911.02618.17
SWE-bench Verified79.3%—
DeepSWE37.4%—
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)—75.8%
SWE-bench Multilingual—68.3%
SciCode53.1%—
WeirdML62.6%—

Agentic & Tool Use MiniMax-M2.5 leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 24.7 (#114), MiniMax-M2.5: 30.4 (#77)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
Vending-Bench 25,396-23.16
Terminal-Bench—42.7%
APEX-Agents27.5%—
GBAEval6.7%—
GDP.pdf14%—

Reasoning Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 62.8 (#18), MiniMax-M2.5: 17.5 (#292)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
ARC-AGI-272.1%4.9%
NYT Connections (extended)92.6%16.8%
ARC-AGI-192.5%63.7%
LMArena Hard Prompts14881372
Epoch Capabilities Index154.46146.68
SimpleBench76.7%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark—55.2%
CritPt13.1%—
Chess Puzzles50%—
EnigmaEval25.4%—
EBR-Bench4.8%—
Mystery Game Puzzles32%—
DTBench94.7%—
LMCA47.1%—
Surface Evolver Bench58.1%—
ForecastBench59—

Math Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 60.7 (#36), MiniMax-M2.5: 26.9 (#253)

Knowledge Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 66.3 (#11), MiniMax-M2.5: 39.2 (#135)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena Expert14951379
GPQA Diamond92.8%—
SimpleQA Verified66.2%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate—9.1%

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 45.7 (#15), MiniMax-M2.5: —

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena Vision1310—
Blueprint-Bench 233.6%—
LMArena Document1463—

Multilingual Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 57.0 (#13), MiniMax-M2.5: 47.1 (#152)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena Non-English14761338
LMArena Chinese15261393
LMArena French14901362
LMArena German14921362
LMArena Japanese14861171
LMArena Korean14511232
LMArena Russian14931358
LMArena Spanish14801354

Instruction Following Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 77.0 (#30), MiniMax-M2.5: 71.5 (#148)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena Instruction Following14671353

Long Context Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 45.4 (#38), MiniMax-M2.5: 37.5 (#216)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena Longer Query14821366
CL-bench—11.4%
CL-bench Life—6.3%

Writing & Preference Gemini 3.5 Flash leads

Gemini 3.5 Flash: 65.5 (#47), MiniMax-M2.5: 53.9 (#153)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGemini 3.5 FlashMiniMax-M2.5
LMArena Text14821359
LMArena Creative Writing14701331
LMArena Multi-Turn14811364
EQ-Bench Creative Writing—1361
EQ-Bench 41087—

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemini 3.5 Flash better than MiniMax-M2.5?

Gemini 3.5 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.2 to 38.3 on the Noometry Index. MiniMax-M2.5 costs 6.4× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.5 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.5 Flash or MiniMax-M2.5?

MiniMax-M2.5 is cheaper. It lists at $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; Gemini 3.5 Flash lists at $1.50 and $9.

Is Gemini 3.5 Flash or MiniMax-M2.5 better for coding?

Gemini 3.5 Flash scores higher on coding benchmarks: 49.4 versus 48.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 3.5 Flash does, with 1.05M tokens against 205K.

How many benchmarks do Gemini 3.5 Flash and MiniMax-M2.5 share?

25 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3.5 Flash has 54 scored results on Noometry and MiniMax-M2.5 has 33.

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