Model comparison

MiniMax-M3 vs Phi-4

MiniMax-M3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.8 to 31.2 on the Noometry Index. Phi-4 costs 6.0× less per token, which makes it the better buy when MiniMax-M3's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 11, 2026. 21 shared benchmarks.

MiniMax-M3

MiniMax

43.8

Rank #85 Confirmed

Phi-4

Microsoft

31.2

Rank #279 Confirmed

Summary

They share 21 benchmarks with published results for both. MiniMax-M3 scores higher in 8 categories and Phi-4 in 1 category; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in knowledge, where MiniMax-M3 leads 58.4 to 32.6.
The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 71.1% for MiniMax-M3 and 13.8% for Phi-4.
Phi-4 is cheaper at $0.07 / $0.14 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $1.20 for MiniMax-M3.
MiniMax-M3 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 128K.

Side by side

MiniMax-M3 and Phi-4 specifications
	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
Provider	MiniMax	Microsoft
Noometry Index	43.8	31.2
Released	2026-06-01	2024-12-11
Weights	Open	Open
Context window	1M	128K
Max output	512K	4K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.30	$0.07
Output $ / M tokens	$1.20	$0.14
Results tracked	41	37

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Category by category

Coding MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 41.8 (#118), Phi-4: 34.4 (#239)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
LMArena Coding	1469	1231
FrontierCode	14.7%	—
LMArena WebDev	1482	—
SciCode	47.1%	—
BigCodeBench Instruct	—	45.5%
LiveBench Coding	—	30.7%
BigCodeBench Complete	—	55.4%
ALE-Bench	640.02	—

Agentic & Tool Use Too close to call

MiniMax-M3: 22.6 (#130), Phi-4: 22.8 (#128)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
APEX-Agents	37.7%	—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard	—	28.8%
OSWorld 2.0	4.6%	—
BALROG	—	11.6%
GBAEval	0.9%	—
Vending-Bench 2	2,158	—

Reasoning MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 30.1 (#87), Phi-4: 17.7 (#291)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
Chess Puzzles	14%	1%
LMArena Hard Prompts	1447	1220
Epoch Capabilities Index	146.95	130.42
SimpleBench	45.8%	—
NYT Connections (extended)	65.1%	—
CritPt	3.7%	—
LiveBench Reasoning	—	47.8%
Mystery Game Puzzles	8%	—
DTBench	78.9%	—
LiveBench Data Analysis	—	45.2%
LMCA	33.7%	—
Surface Evolver Bench	55%	—
ForecastBench	61.4	—
LiveBench	—	41.6%

Math MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 40.0 (#95), Phi-4: 20.8 (#285)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	71.1%	13.8%
LMArena Math	1429	1246
ProofBench	18%	—
LiveBench Math	—	42%
MATH Level 5	—	64.9%

Knowledge MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 58.4 (#35), Phi-4: 32.6 (#209)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
GPQA Diamond	90.9%	56.1%
LMArena Expert	1461	1203
Confabulations	—	29.4%
Vectara Hallucination Rate	—	3.7%
MMLU	—	84.8%

Multimodal Not comparable

MiniMax-M3: 40.2 (#51), Phi-4: —

Multimodal benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
LMArena Vision	1253	—
LMArena Document	1435	—

Multilingual MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 53.0 (#75), Phi-4: 37.2 (#237)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
LMArena Non-English	1420	1197
LMArena Chinese	1463	1212
LMArena French	1447	1224
LMArena German	1426	1222
LMArena Japanese	1381	1158
LMArena Korean	1372	1151
LMArena Russian	1428	1209
LMArena Spanish	1432	1234

Instruction Following MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 75.5 (#62), Phi-4: 60.4 (#251)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
LMArena Instruction Following	1433	1201
LiveBench Instruction Following	—	58.4%

Long Context MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 44.2 (#72), Phi-4: 36.9 (#226)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
LMArena Longer Query	1445	1217

Writing & Preference MiniMax-M3 leads

MiniMax-M3: 62.1 (#83), Phi-4: 40.5 (#244)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M3	Phi-4
LMArena Text	1433	1217
LMArena Creative Writing	1404	1182
LMArena Multi-Turn	1442	1206
Short-Story Creative Writing	—	62.6%
EQ-Bench 4	1150	—
LiveBench Language	—	25.6%

Frequently asked questions

Is MiniMax-M3 better than Phi-4?

Which is cheaper, MiniMax-M3 or Phi-4?

Phi-4 is cheaper. It lists at $0.07 per million input tokens and $0.14 per million output tokens; MiniMax-M3 lists at $0.30 and $1.20.

Is MiniMax-M3 or Phi-4 better for coding?

MiniMax-M3 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 41.8 versus 34.4 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

MiniMax-M3 does, with 1M tokens against 128K.

How many benchmarks do MiniMax-M3 and Phi-4 share?

21 benchmarks have published results for both models. MiniMax-M3 has 41 scored results on Noometry and Phi-4 has 37.