Model comparison

GPT-5.6 Luna vs Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct

GPT-5.6 Luna is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.7 to 28.8 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.

GPT-5.6 Luna OpenAI

54.7

Rank #24 Confirmed

Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct Microsoft

28.8

Rank #310 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-5.6 Luna scores higher in 8 categories and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where GPT-5.6 Luna leads 77.5 to 25.4.
  • Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GPT-5.6 Luna and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct specifications
GPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
ProviderOpenAIMicrosoft
Noometry Index54.728.8
Released2026-07-092024-04-23
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M—
Max output128K—
Input $ / M tokens$0.20—
Output $ / M tokens$1.20—
Results tracked5132

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Category by category

Coding GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 53.9 (#25), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 27.4 (#313)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Coding14661102
DeepSWE67.2%—
FrontierCode39.8%—
CursorBench35.9%—
LMArena WebDev1517—
SciCode53.6%—
WeirdML60.9%—
LiveBench Coding—20.3%
ALE-Bench1,667—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

GPT-5.6 Luna: 35.3 (#37), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
BALROG45.6%—
GDP.pdf22.7%—
Vending-Bench 24,095—

Reasoning GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 47.5 (#38), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 14.2 (#319)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Hard Prompts14521100
ARC-AGI-259.5%—
SimpleBench46.8%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark49.1%—
NYT Connections (extended)69.4%—
ARC-AGI-188%—
CritPt20.6%—
Chess Puzzles40%—
LiveBench Reasoning—15.9%
Mystery Game Puzzles21%—
DTBench89.1%—
LiveBench Data Analysis—30.3%
LMCA48.5%—
Surface Evolver Bench61.9%—
Adversarial NLI—58.1%
BIG-Bench Hard—79.1%
Epoch Capabilities Index156.32—
HellaSwag—77%
LiveBench—24%
WinoGrande—81.5%

Math GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 77.5 (#12), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 25.4 (#247)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Math14551151
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)82.1%—
FrontierMath Tier 461%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202598.3%—
ProofBench60%—
LiveBench Math—17.6%

Knowledge GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 58.6 (#31), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 28.5 (#237)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Expert14791067
GPQA Diamond91.6%—
SimpleQA Verified41%—
ARC (AI2) Challenge—90.7%
MMLU—75.7%
OpenBookQA—88%
TriviaQA—58.1%

Multimodal Not comparable

GPT-5.6 Luna: 43.0 (#22), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: —

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Vision1259—
Blueprint-Bench 222.6%—
Furniture Assembly42.5%—
LMArena Document1457—

Multilingual GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 53.0 (#73), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 28.6 (#267)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Non-English14181058
LMArena Chinese14691061
LMArena French14571134
LMArena German14591080
LMArena Japanese1416966
LMArena Korean1414894
LMArena Russian14281111
LMArena Spanish14451111

Instruction Following GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 76.0 (#48), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 52.2 (#287)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Instruction Following14401087
LiveBench Instruction Following—47.2%

Long Context GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 43.9 (#78), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 33.0 (#262)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Longer Query14371088

Writing & Preference GPT-5.6 Luna leads

GPT-5.6 Luna: 68.3 (#27), Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 31.3 (#279)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 LunaPhi 3 Small 8k Instruct
LMArena Text14321110
LMArena Creative Writing13971083
LMArena Multi-Turn14331068
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1829—
EQ-Bench 41156—
LiveBench Language—12.9%

Frequently asked questions

Is GPT-5.6 Luna better than Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct?

GPT-5.6 Luna is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.7 to 28.8 on the Noometry Index.

Is GPT-5.6 Luna or Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct better for coding?

GPT-5.6 Luna scores higher on coding benchmarks: 53.9 versus 27.4 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do GPT-5.6 Luna and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-5.6 Luna has 51 scored results on Noometry and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct has 32.

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