Noometry

Model comparison

Gemma 3 12B vs GLM-4.6

GLM-4.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.4 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 13× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GLM-4.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.

Gemma 3 12B Google

32.1

Rank #262 Confirmed

GLM-4.6 Z.ai (Zhipu)

41.4

Rank #135 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 3 12B scores higher in 0 categories and GLM-4.6 in 9 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where GLM-4.6 leads 39.1 to 22.3.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard: 30.4% for Gemma 3 12B and 72.4% for GLM-4.6.
  • Gemma 3 12B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.60 / $2.20 for GLM-4.6.
  • GLM-4.6 accepts more context: 205K tokens versus 131K.

Side by side

Gemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
ProviderGoogleZ.ai (Zhipu)
Noometry Index32.141.4
Released2025-03-122025-09-30
WeightsOpenOpen
Context window131K205K
Max output8K131K
Input $ / M tokens$0.05$0.60
Output $ / M tokens$0.15$2.20
Results tracked2429

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Category by category

Coding GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280), GLM-4.6: 40.1 (#148)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
SciCode17.4%38.4%
LMArena Coding12811449
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)—55.4%
LMArena WebDev—1340
ALE-Bench—340.82

Agentic & Tool Use GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108), GLM-4.6: 32.3 (#66)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard30.4%72.4%
Terminal-Bench—24.5%

Reasoning GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313), GLM-4.6: 23.7 (#172)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
CritPt0%1.1%
LMArena Hard Prompts13091440
Kagi LLM Benchmark—47.4%
Chess Puzzles0%—
DTBench48.8%—
LMCA4.5%—
Epoch Capabilities Index123.5—

Math GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279), GLM-4.6: 39.1 (#111)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
LMArena Math13071432
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202516.7%—
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)—3.8%
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)—2.1%

Knowledge GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257), GLM-4.6: 40.2 (#124)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
Vectara Hallucination Rate4.4%9.5%
LMArena Expert12481431
GPQA Diamond39.5%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemma 3 12B: —, GLM-4.6: —

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
MindCube46.7%—

Multilingual GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165), GLM-4.6: 53.5 (#66)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
LMArena Non-English13181426
LMArena German13701447
LMArena Russian13351419
LMArena Chinese—1499
LMArena French—1459
LMArena Japanese—1393
LMArena Korean—1400
LMArena Spanish—1436

Instruction Following GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186), GLM-4.6: 74.3 (#98)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
LMArena Instruction Following12991410

Long Context GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162), GLM-4.6: 43.4 (#94)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
LMArena Longer Query13171422

Writing & Preference GLM-4.6 leads

Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209), GLM-4.6: 61.1 (#90)

BenchmarkGemma 3 12BGLM-4.6
LMArena Text13341440
LMArena Creative Writing13311411
EQ-Bench Creative Writing11261411
LMArena Multi-Turn13341427

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemma 3 12B better than GLM-4.6?

GLM-4.6 is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.4 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 13× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GLM-4.6's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Gemma 3 12B or GLM-4.6?

Gemma 3 12B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.15 per million output tokens; GLM-4.6 lists at $0.60 and $2.20.

Is Gemma 3 12B or GLM-4.6 better for coding?

GLM-4.6 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

GLM-4.6 does, with 205K tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Gemma 3 12B and GLM-4.6 share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 3 12B has 24 scored results on Noometry and GLM-4.6 has 29.

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