Model comparison
MiniMax-M2.1 vs Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct
MiniMax-M2.1 is the stronger model overall, scoring 38.4 to 27.4 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.
MiniMax
MicrosoftSummary
- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. MiniMax-M2.1 scores higher in 8 categories and Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where MiniMax-M2.1 leads 58.5 to 27.7.
Side by side
| MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | MiniMax | Microsoft |
| Noometry Index | 38.4 | 27.4 |
| Released | 2025-12-23 | 2024-04-23 |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | 205K | — |
| Max output | 131K | — |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.30 | — |
| Output $ / M tokens | $1.20 | — |
| Results tracked | 22 | 35 |
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Category by category
Coding MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 40.1 (#132), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 26.1 (#319)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1421 | 1093 |
| LMArena WebDev | 1384 | — |
| LiveBench Coding | — | 15.5% |
| ALE-Bench | 623.83 | — |
| HumanEval+ | — | 59.1% |
| MBPP+ | — | 54.2% |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
MiniMax-M2.1: 27.7 (#91), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: —
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | 36.6% | — |
Reasoning MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 15.8 (#301), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 13.6 (#326)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1410 | 1072 |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 11.2% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 0% |
| LiveBench Reasoning | — | 26.8% |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | — | 34.7% |
| Adversarial NLI | — | 52.8% |
| BIG-Bench Hard | — | 71.7% |
| HellaSwag | — | 76.7% |
| LiveBench | — | 22.4% |
| WinoGrande | — | 70.8% |
Math MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 35.6 (#142), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 24.5 (#258)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1396 | 1111 |
| LiveBench Math | — | 15.7% |
Knowledge MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 37.7 (#143), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 27.9 (#241)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1432 | 1045 |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 11.8% | — |
| ARC (AI2) Challenge | — | 84.9% |
| MMLU | — | 68.8% |
| OpenBookQA | — | 88% |
| TriviaQA | — | 64% |
Multilingual MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 50.2 (#123), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 26.5 (#275)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1378 | 1021 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1430 | 1021 |
| LMArena French | 1405 | 1075 |
| LMArena German | 1380 | 1044 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1287 | 935 |
| LMArena Korean | 1297 | 905 |
| LMArena Russian | 1386 | 1022 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1396 | 1084 |
Instruction Following MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 74.0 (#108), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 48.0 (#298)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1399 | 1053 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | — | 39.1% |
Long Context MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 43.2 (#98), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 31.7 (#271)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1416 | 1044 |
Writing & Preference MiniMax-M2.1 leads
MiniMax-M2.1: 58.5 (#114), Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 27.7 (#295)
| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2.1 | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1392 | 1073 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1362 | 1037 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1396 | 1018 |
| LiveBench Language | — | 9.2% |
Frequently asked questions
Is MiniMax-M2.1 better than Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct?
MiniMax-M2.1 is the stronger model overall, scoring 38.4 to 27.4 on the Noometry Index.
Is MiniMax-M2.1 or Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct better for coding?
MiniMax-M2.1 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 26.1 in the Noometry coding category.
How many benchmarks do MiniMax-M2.1 and Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct share?
17 benchmarks have published results for both models. MiniMax-M2.1 has 22 scored results on Noometry and Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct has 35.