Model comparison

GPT-5 Nano vs Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct

GPT-5 Nano is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.5 to 29.7 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 16 shared benchmarks.

GPT-5 Nano OpenAI

33.5

Rank #241 Confirmed

Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct Microsoft

29.7

Rank #305 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 16 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-5 Nano scores higher in 6 categories and Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct in 2 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in instruction following, where GPT-5 Nano leads 75.0 to 51.8.
  • Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GPT-5 Nano and Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct specifications
GPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
ProviderOpenAIMicrosoft
Noometry Index33.529.7
Released2025-08-072024-04-23
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window400K—
Max output128K—
Input $ / M tokens$0.05—
Output $ / M tokens$0.40—
Results tracked4919

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Category by category

Coding GPT-5 Nano leads

GPT-5 Nano: 33.6 (#254), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 28.8 (#312)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Coding13511039
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)34.8%—
WeirdML38.1%—
BigCodeBench Instruct—29.6%
BigCodeBench Complete—40.6%
ALE-Bench718.67—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

GPT-5 Nano: 25.8 (#106), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
Terminal-Bench21.8%—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard51.5%—

Reasoning Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct leads

GPT-5 Nano: 16.3 (#306), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 19.6 (#256)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Hard Prompts13281028
ARC-AGI-22.6%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark62.2%—
ARC-AGI-120.7%—
Chess Puzzles27%—
Mystery Game Puzzles9%—
DTBench62.7%—
LMCA7.9%—
Epoch Capabilities Index139.38—
ForecastBench59.1—

Math Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct leads

GPT-5 Nano: 29.4 (#241), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 31.6 (#222)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Math13171089
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)20%—
FrontierMath Tier 42.4%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202581.1%—
ProofBench12%—
Omni-MATH54.6%—
MATH Level 595.2%—
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)8.3%—
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)2.1%—

Knowledge GPT-5 Nano leads

GPT-5 Nano: 35.9 (#178), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 26.8 (#254)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Expert1321984
GPQA Diamond69.4%—
SimpleQA Verified11.7%—
MMLU-Pro77.8%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate10.5%—
GPQA (HELM)67.9%—

Multimodal Not comparable

GPT-5 Nano: 31.3 (#108), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: —

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Vision1159—
VPCT37.2%—

Multilingual GPT-5 Nano leads

GPT-5 Nano: 45.3 (#172), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 25.2 (#285)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Non-English13131000
LMArena Chinese13561016
LMArena German13271006
LMArena Japanese1226899
LMArena Korean1269856
LMArena Russian12961004
LMArena Spanish13601059
LMArena French—1039

Instruction Following GPT-5 Nano leads

GPT-5 Nano: 75.0 (#79), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 51.8 (#294)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Instruction Following13061023
IFEval93.2%—

Long Context Too close to call

GPT-5 Nano: 31.3 (#281), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 30.4 (#289)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Longer Query1312996
Fiction.LiveBench44.4%—

Writing & Preference GPT-5 Nano leads

GPT-5 Nano: 39.1 (#249), Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct: 27.1 (#301)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 NanoPhi 3 Mini 128k Instruct
LMArena Text13201050
LMArena Creative Writing12491024
LMArena Multi-Turn1311989
EQ-Bench Creative Writing705—
WildBench80.6%—

Frequently asked questions

Is GPT-5 Nano better than Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct?

GPT-5 Nano is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.5 to 29.7 on the Noometry Index.

Is GPT-5 Nano or Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct better for coding?

GPT-5 Nano scores higher on coding benchmarks: 33.6 versus 28.8 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do GPT-5 Nano and Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct share?

16 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-5 Nano has 49 scored results on Noometry and Phi 3 Mini 128k Instruct has 19.

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