Model comparison
Gemma 3 12B vs Llama 3.1-405B
Gemma 3 12B is the stronger model overall, scoring 32.1 to 30.7 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.
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MetaSummary
- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 3 12B scores higher in 6 categories and Llama 3.1-405B in 3 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Gemma 3 12B leads 47.5 to 38.9.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is DTBench: 48.8% for Gemma 3 12B and 61.4% for Llama 3.1-405B.
Side by side
| Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Meta | |
| Noometry Index | 32.1 | 30.7 |
| Released | 2025-03-12 | 2024-07-23 |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | 131K | — |
| Max output | 8K | — |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.05 | — |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.15 | — |
| Results tracked | 24 | 42 |
Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry
Category by category
Coding Llama 3.1-405B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280), Llama 3.1-405B: 33.1 (#262)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1281 | 1291 |
| SciCode | 17.4% | — |
| WeirdML | — | 21.4% |
Agentic & Tool Use Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108), Llama 3.1-405B: 21.0 (#140)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 30.4% | — |
| TheAgentCompany | — | 7.4% |
| Cybench | — | 7.5% |
Reasoning Llama 3.1-405B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313), Llama 3.1-405B: 16.8 (#300)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1309 | 1269 |
| DTBench | 48.8% | 61.4% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 123.5 | 128.75 |
| SimpleBench | — | 23% |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 45% |
| CritPt | 0% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| LMCA | 4.5% | — |
| BIG-Bench Hard | — | 82.9% |
| ForecastBench | — | 59.9 |
| HellaSwag | — | 89.2% |
| PIQA | — | 85.9% |
| WinoGrande | — | 89.2% |
Math Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279), Llama 3.1-405B: 18.4 (#290)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 16.7% | 9.7% |
| LMArena Math | 1307 | 1281 |
| Omni-MATH | — | 24.9% |
| MATH Level 5 | — | 49.8% |
Knowledge Llama 3.1-405B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257), Llama 3.1-405B: 30.4 (#227)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 39.5% | 50.9% |
| LMArena Expert | 1248 | 1243 |
| MMLU-Pro | — | 72.3% |
| Confabulations | — | 17.6% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 4.4% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | — | 52.2% |
| ARC (AI2) Challenge | — | 95.3% |
| MMLU | — | 84.5% |
| TriviaQA | — | 82.7% |
Multimodal Not comparable
Gemma 3 12B: —, Llama 3.1-405B: —
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| MindCube | 46.7% | — |
Multilingual Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165), Llama 3.1-405B: 40.7 (#214)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1318 | 1248 |
| LMArena German | 1370 | 1252 |
| LMArena Russian | 1335 | 1265 |
| LMArena Chinese | — | 1242 |
| LMArena French | — | 1279 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1208 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1184 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1260 |
Instruction Following Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186), Llama 3.1-405B: 65.9 (#214)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1299 | 1259 |
| IFEval | — | 81.1% |
Long Context Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162), Llama 3.1-405B: 38.4 (#197)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1317 | 1266 |
Writing & Preference Gemma 3 12B leads
Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209), Llama 3.1-405B: 38.9 (#251)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 12B | Llama 3.1-405B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1334 | 1284 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1331 | 1262 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1126 | 870 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1334 | 1297 |
| WildBench | — | 78.3% |
Frequently asked questions
Is Gemma 3 12B better than Llama 3.1-405B?
Gemma 3 12B is the stronger model overall, scoring 32.1 to 30.7 on the Noometry Index.
Is Gemma 3 12B or Llama 3.1-405B better for coding?
Llama 3.1-405B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 33.1 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.
How many benchmarks do Gemma 3 12B and Llama 3.1-405B share?
17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 3 12B has 24 scored results on Noometry and Llama 3.1-405B has 42.