Noometry

Model comparison

Gemini 3.6 Flash vs MiniMax-M2.1

Gemini 3.6 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.1 to 38.4 on the Noometry Index. MiniMax-M2.1 costs 2.9× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.6 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 20 shared benchmarks.

Gemini 3.6 Flash Google

54.1

Rank #30 Confirmed

MiniMax-M2.1 MiniMax

38.4

Rank #177 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 20 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3.6 Flash scores higher in 9 categories and MiniMax-M2.1 in 0 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Gemini 3.6 Flash leads 58.9 to 15.8.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is NYT Connections (extended): 89% for Gemini 3.6 Flash and 11.2% for MiniMax-M2.1.
  • MiniMax-M2.1 is cheaper at $0.30 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $0.75 / $3.75 for Gemini 3.6 Flash.
  • Gemini 3.6 Flash accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 205K.
  • MiniMax-M2.1 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Gemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
ProviderGoogleMiniMax
Noometry Index54.138.4
Released2026-07-212025-12-23
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M205K
Max output66K131K
Input $ / M tokens$0.75$0.30
Output $ / M tokens$3.75$1.20
Results tracked4622

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Category by category

Coding Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 49.6 (#45), MiniMax-M2.1: 40.1 (#132)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena WebDev15361384
LMArena Coding14921421
ALE-Bench715.52623.83
DeepSWE46.7%—
FrontierCode34.4%—
SciCode52.7%—
WeirdML56.1%—

Agentic & Tool Use Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 32.4 (#56), MiniMax-M2.1: 27.7 (#91)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
Terminal-Bench—36.6%
APEX-Agents46.9%—
GDP.pdf14%—

Reasoning Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 58.9 (#20), MiniMax-M2.1: 15.8 (#301)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
NYT Connections (extended)89%11.2%
LMArena Hard Prompts14861410
ARC-AGI-260.4%—
ARC-AGI-191.2%—
CritPt10.6%—
Chess Puzzles43%—
Mystery Game Puzzles30%—
DTBench95.5%—
LMCA44.9%—
Epoch Capabilities Index154.36—

Math Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 57.0 (#33), MiniMax-M2.1: 35.6 (#142)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Math15041396
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)58.9%—
FrontierMath Tier 422%—
MathArena Final-Answer Competitions70.8%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202594.2%—
ProofBench36%—

Knowledge Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 67.8 (#7), MiniMax-M2.1: 37.7 (#143)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Expert14891432
GPQA Diamond94.1%—
SimpleQA Verified66.2%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate—11.8%

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 38.7 (#55), MiniMax-M2.1: —

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Vision1297—
Blueprint-Bench 231.2%—
Furniture Assembly23.3%—
LMArena Document1456—

Multilingual Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 56.8 (#17), MiniMax-M2.1: 50.2 (#123)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Non-English14701378
LMArena Chinese15301430
LMArena French15011405
LMArena German14781380
LMArena Japanese14771287
LMArena Korean14351297
LMArena Russian14901386
LMArena Spanish14771396

Instruction Following Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 77.2 (#27), MiniMax-M2.1: 74.0 (#108)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Instruction Following14671399

Long Context Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 45.1 (#47), MiniMax-M2.1: 43.2 (#98)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Longer Query14751416

Writing & Preference Gemini 3.6 Flash leads

Gemini 3.6 Flash: 68.3 (#26), MiniMax-M2.1: 58.5 (#114)

BenchmarkGemini 3.6 FlashMiniMax-M2.1
LMArena Text14781392
LMArena Creative Writing14641362
LMArena Multi-Turn14811396
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1604—

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemini 3.6 Flash better than MiniMax-M2.1?

Gemini 3.6 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.1 to 38.4 on the Noometry Index. MiniMax-M2.1 costs 2.9× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.6 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.6 Flash or MiniMax-M2.1?

MiniMax-M2.1 is cheaper. It lists at $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; Gemini 3.6 Flash lists at $0.75 and $3.75.

Is Gemini 3.6 Flash or MiniMax-M2.1 better for coding?

Gemini 3.6 Flash scores higher on coding benchmarks: 49.6 versus 40.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 3.6 Flash does, with 1.05M tokens against 205K.

How many benchmarks do Gemini 3.6 Flash and MiniMax-M2.1 share?

20 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3.6 Flash has 46 scored results on Noometry and MiniMax-M2.1 has 22.

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