# DeepSeek V4 Flash vs Gemma 3 12B

> DeepSeek V4 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 53.6 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 3.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when DeepSeek V4 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/deepseek-v4-flash-vs-gemma-3-12b
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 21

## Summary

- They share 21 benchmarks with published results for both. DeepSeek V4 Flash scores higher in 8 categories and Gemma 3 12B in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where DeepSeek V4 Flash leads 53.7 to 15.7.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 94.4% for DeepSeek V4 Flash and 16.7% for Gemma 3 12B.
- Gemma 3 12B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.15 / $0.60 for DeepSeek V4 Flash.
- DeepSeek V4 Flash accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 131K.

## Snapshot

| | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | DeepSeek | Google |
| Noometry Index | 53.6 | 32.1 |
| Rank | 35 | 262 |
| Context | 1M | 131K |
| Input $/M | $0.15 | $0.05 |
| Output $/M | $0.60 | $0.15 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 47.9 (#59)
- Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | 49.9% | 17.4% |
| LMArena Coding | 1457 | 1281 |
| FrontierCode | 18.8% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1582 | — |
| WeirdML | 63% | — |
| ALE-Bench | 1,306 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: —
- Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 30.4% |

## Reasoning

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 53.7 (#30)
- Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | 16.6% | 0% |
| Chess Puzzles | 33% | 0% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1444 | 1309 |
| DTBench | 90.9% | 48.8% |
| LMCA | 41.7% | 4.5% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 154.49 | 123.5 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 61.4% | — |
| SimpleBench | 61.1% | — |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 52.2% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 89.6% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 89% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 34% | — |

## Math

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 60.3 (#37)
- Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 94.4% | 16.7% |
| LMArena Math | 1427 | 1307 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 57.5% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 24.4% | — |
| MathArena Final-Answer Competitions | 76.5% | — |
| ProofBench | 56% | — |

## Knowledge

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 55.4 (#48)
- Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 91% | 39.5% |
| LMArena Expert | 1441 | 1248 |
| SimpleQA Verified | 33.6% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 4.4% |

## Multimodal

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: —
- Gemma 3 12B: —

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| MindCube | — | 46.7% |

## Multilingual

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 53.0 (#72)
- Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1420 | 1318 |
| LMArena German | 1418 | 1370 |
| LMArena Russian | 1428 | 1335 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1468 | — |
| LMArena French | 1439 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1406 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1384 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1436 | — |

## Instruction Following

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 74.9 (#81)
- Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1421 | 1299 |

## Long Context

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 43.8 (#85)
- Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1434 | 1317 |

## Writing & Preference

- DeepSeek V4 Flash: 63.8 (#61)
- Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209)

| Benchmark | DeepSeek V4 Flash | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1432 | 1334 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1403 | 1331 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1559 | 1126 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1449 | 1334 |

## FAQ

### Is DeepSeek V4 Flash better than Gemma 3 12B?

DeepSeek V4 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 53.6 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 3.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when DeepSeek V4 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, DeepSeek V4 Flash or Gemma 3 12B?

Gemma 3 12B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.15 per million output tokens; DeepSeek V4 Flash lists at $0.15 and $0.60.

### Is DeepSeek V4 Flash or Gemma 3 12B better for coding?

DeepSeek V4 Flash scores higher on coding benchmarks: 47.9 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

DeepSeek V4 Flash does, with 1M tokens against 131K.

### How many benchmarks do DeepSeek V4 Flash and Gemma 3 12B share?

21 benchmarks have published results for both models. DeepSeek V4 Flash has 41 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 3 12B has 24.