Model comparison
Gemma 3 12B vs Granite 4.2 3b
Granite 4.2 3b is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 31.8 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 10 shared benchmarks.
GoogleSummary
- They share 10 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 3 12B scores higher in 3 categories and Granite 4.2 3b in 4 categories; 5 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Granite 4.2 3b leads 25.0 to 15.2.
Side by side
| Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | |
| Noometry Index | 31.8 | 39.0 |
| Released | 2025-03-12 | — |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | 131K | — |
| Max output | 8K | — |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.05 | — |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.15 | — |
| Results tracked | 24 | 11 |
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Category by category
Coding Granite 4.2 3b leads
Gemma 3 12B: 31.2 (#276), Granite 4.2 3b: 39.4 (#146)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1281 | 1363 |
| SciCode | 17.4% | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Gemma 3 12B: 25.3 (#101), Granite 4.2 3b: —
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 30.4% | — |
Reasoning Granite 4.2 3b leads
Gemma 3 12B: 15.2 (#307), Granite 4.2 3b: 25.0 (#136)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1309 | 1308 |
| CritPt | 0% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| DTBench | 48.8% | — |
| LMCA | 4.5% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 123.49 | — |
Math Not comparable
Gemma 3 12B: 21.0 (#273), Granite 4.2 3b: —
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 16.7% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1307 | — |
Knowledge Granite 4.2 3b leads
Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#250), Granite 4.2 3b: 35.6 (#169)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1248 | 1313 |
| GPQA Diamond | 39.5% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 4.4% | — |
Multimodal Not comparable
Gemma 3 12B: —, Granite 4.2 3b: —
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| MindCube | 46.7% | — |
Multilingual Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 45.9 (#160), Granite 4.2 3b: 42.4 (#193)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1318 | 1268 |
| LMArena Russian | 1335 | 1249 |
| LMArena Chinese | — | 1268 |
| LMArena German | 1370 | — |
Instruction Following Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 68.8 (#179), Granite 4.2 3b: 67.2 (#195)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1299 | 1271 |
Long Context Too close to call
Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#157), Granite 4.2 3b: 39.3 (#179)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1317 | 1293 |
Writing & Preference Too close to call
Gemma 3 12B: 47.7 (#205), Granite 4.2 3b: 47.9 (#202)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Granite 4.2 3b |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1334 | 1295 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1331 | 1215 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1334 | 1293 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1126 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Gemma 3 12B better than Granite 4.2 3b?
Granite 4.2 3b is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 31.8 on the Noometry Index.
Is Gemma 3 12B or Granite 4.2 3b better for coding?
Granite 4.2 3b scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.4 versus 31.2 in the Noometry coding category.
How many benchmarks do Gemma 3 12B and Granite 4.2 3b share?
10 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 3 12B has 24 scored results on Noometry and Granite 4.2 3b has 11.