# Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite vs Llama 3.2 3B

> Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.0 to 28.9 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gemini-2-5-flash-lite-vs-llama-3-2-3b
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 14

## Summary

- They share 14 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite scores higher in 8 categories and Llama 3.2 3B in 1 category; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite leads 56.8 to 24.7.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard: 36.9% for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite and 21.9% for Llama 3.2 3B.
- Llama 3.2 3B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.33 per million input/output tokens, against $0.10 / $0.40 for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite.
- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 131K.
- Llama 3.2 3B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Google | Meta |
| Noometry Index | 37.0 | 28.9 |
| Rank | 211 | 321 |
| Context | 1.05M | 131K |
| Input $/M | $0.10 | $0.05 |
| Output $/M | $0.40 | $0.33 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |

## Coding

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 38.5 (#173)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 27.6 (#319)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1373 | 1098 |
| WeirdML | 35.2% | — |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | — | 23.4% |
| BigCodeBench Complete | — | 28.3% |
| ALE-Bench | 325.9 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 28.0 (#96)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 20.1 (#143)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 36.9% | 21.9% |
| BALROG | — | 10.1% |

## Reasoning

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 22.2 (#205)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 21.0 (#228)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1377 | 1095 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 40.5% | — |
| DTBench | 62.8% | — |
| LMCA | 18.1% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 133.94 | — |

## Math

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 38.0 (#144)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 32.4 (#214)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1373 | 1126 |
| Omni-MATH | 48% | — |

## Knowledge

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 32.5 (#210)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 29.7 (#235)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1373 | 1090 |
| MMLU-Pro | 53.7% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 3.3% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 30.9% | — |

## Multimodal

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 29.1 (#114)
- Llama 3.2 3B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1198 | — |
| VPCT | 30% | — |

## Multilingual

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 49.3 (#134)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 26.2 (#281)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1369 | 1019 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1404 | 1017 |
| LMArena German | 1389 | 1056 |
| LMArena Russian | 1373 | 949 |
| LMArena French | 1388 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1359 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1360 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1396 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 70.0 (#168)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 56.0 (#275)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1367 | 1089 |
| IFEval | 81% | — |

## Long Context

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 33.3 (#262)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 33.4 (#261)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1373 | 1100 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | 47.2% | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: 56.8 (#135)
- Llama 3.2 3B: 24.7 (#307)

| Benchmark | Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite | Llama 3.2 3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1379 | 1110 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1367 | 1094 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1366 | 1105 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | — | 595 |
| WildBench | 81.8% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite better than Llama 3.2 3B?

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.0 to 28.9 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite or Llama 3.2 3B?

Llama 3.2 3B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.33 per million output tokens; Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite lists at $0.10 and $0.40.

### Is Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite or Llama 3.2 3B better for coding?

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 38.5 versus 27.6 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite does, with 1.05M tokens against 131K.

### How many benchmarks do Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite and Llama 3.2 3B share?

14 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite has 33 scored results on Noometry and Llama 3.2 3B has 18.
