Noometry

Model comparison

Gemini 3 Flash Preview vs Gemma 3 12B

Gemini 3 Flash Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 52.3 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 15× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3 Flash Preview's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 19 shared benchmarks.

Gemini 3 Flash Preview Google

52.3

Rank #40 Confirmed

Gemma 3 12B Google

32.1

Rank #262 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 19 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3 Flash Preview scores higher in 9 categories and Gemma 3 12B in 0 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads 49.2 to 15.7.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 95.6% for Gemini 3 Flash Preview and 16.7% for Gemma 3 12B.
  • Gemma 3 12B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.50 / $3 for Gemini 3 Flash Preview.
  • Gemini 3 Flash Preview 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 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
ProviderGoogleGoogle
Noometry Index52.332.1
Released2025-12-172025-03-12
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M131K
Max output66K8K
Input $ / M tokens$0.50$0.05
Output $ / M tokens$3$0.15
Results tracked5924

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Category by category

Coding Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 50.9 (#42), Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
LMArena Coding14601281
SWE-bench Verified75.4%—
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)75.8%—
LMArena WebDev1439—
SWE-bench Multilingual72.7%—
SciCode—17.4%
GSO9.8%—
WeirdML61.6%—
ALE-Bench1,367—

Agentic & Tool Use Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 38.7 (#29), Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
Terminal-Bench64.3%—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard—30.4%
τ²-bench Airline82.5%—
τ²-bench Banking27.3%—
τ²-bench Retail76.8%—
τ²-bench Telecom91.2%—
DeepResearch Bench49.8%—
BALROG48.1%—
GDP.pdf10%—
LMArena Search1198—
Vending-Bench 23,635—

Reasoning Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 49.2 (#37), Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
Chess Puzzles40%0%
LMArena Hard Prompts14651309
DTBench89.1%48.8%
LMCA43.1%4.5%
Epoch Capabilities Index151.8123.5
ARC-AGI-233.6%—
SimpleBench61.1%—
NYT Connections (extended)83.1%—
ARC-AGI-184.7%—
CritPt—0%
Mystery Game Puzzles26%—
ForecastBench58.5—

Math Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 51.7 (#55), Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202595.6%16.7%
LMArena Math14731307
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)51.2%—
FrontierMath Tier 417.1%—
MathArena Final-Answer Competitions67.6%—
ProofBench15%—
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)35.6%—
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)4.2%—

Knowledge Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 58.8 (#33), Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
GPQA Diamond89.4%39.5%
Vectara Hallucination Rate13.5%4.4%
LMArena Expert14621248
SimpleQA Verified66.8%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 45.5 (#16), Gemma 3 12B: —

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
LMArena Vision1285—
GeoBench88%—
VPCT72.6%—
Blueprint-Bench 20%—
LMArena Document1413—
MindCube—46.7%

Multilingual Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 55.7 (#27), Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
LMArena Non-English14581318
LMArena German14971370
LMArena Russian14801335
LMArena Chinese1511—
LMArena French1477—
LMArena Japanese1489—
LMArena Korean1443—
LMArena Spanish1469—

Instruction Following Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 75.7 (#56), Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
LMArena Instruction Following14371299

Long Context Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 44.4 (#67), Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
LMArena Longer Query14521317

Writing & Preference Gemini 3 Flash Preview leads

Gemini 3 Flash Preview: 65.5 (#45), Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209)

BenchmarkGemini 3 Flash PreviewGemma 3 12B
LMArena Text14661334
LMArena Creative Writing14571331
LMArena Multi-Turn14711334
EQ-Bench Creative Writing—1126

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemini 3 Flash Preview better than Gemma 3 12B?

Gemini 3 Flash Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 52.3 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 15× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3 Flash Preview's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Gemini 3 Flash Preview 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 Flash Preview lists at $0.50 and $3.

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

Gemini 3 Flash Preview scores higher on coding benchmarks: 50.9 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 3 Flash Preview does, with 1.05M tokens against 131K.

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

19 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3 Flash Preview has 59 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 3 12B has 24.

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