# Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite vs Gemma 3 12B

> Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.8 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 7.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gemini-3-1-flash-lite-vs-gemma-3-12b
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 21

## Summary

- They share 21 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite scores higher in 9 categories and Gemma 3 12B in 0 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite leads 40.7 to 22.3.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 80% for Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite and 16.7% for Gemma 3 12B.
- Gemma 3 12B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.25 / $1.50 for Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite.
- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 131K.
- Gemma 3 12B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Google | Google |
| Noometry Index | 40.8 | 32.1 |
| Rank | 144 | 262 |
| Context | 1.05M | 131K |
| Input $/M | $0.25 | $0.05 |
| Output $/M | $1.50 | $0.15 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |

## Coding

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 37.8 (#188)
- Gemma 3 12B: 31.7 (#280)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | 41.9% | 17.4% |
| LMArena Coding | 1400 | 1281 |
| LMArena WebDev | 1256 | — |
| WeirdML | 52.2% | — |
| ALE-Bench | 797.73 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 30.2 (#79)
- Gemma 3 12B: 25.5 (#108)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 30.4% |
| DeepResearch Bench | 37.3% | — |

## Reasoning

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 22.9 (#186)
- Gemma 3 12B: 15.7 (#313)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | 1.1% | 0% |
| Chess Puzzles | 25% | 0% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1407 | 1309 |
| DTBench | 76.8% | 48.8% |
| LMCA | 35% | 4.5% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 144.47 | 123.5 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 67.2% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 8.2% | — |
| EnigmaEval | 3% | — |
| Thematic Generalization | 63.3% | — |
| ForecastBench | 54.4 | — |

## Math

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 40.7 (#90)
- Gemma 3 12B: 22.3 (#279)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 80% | 16.7% |
| LMArena Math | 1428 | 1307 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 27.7% | — |

## Knowledge

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 41.9 (#104)
- Gemma 3 12B: 26.5 (#257)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 81.8% | 39.5% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 8.2% | 4.4% |
| LMArena Expert | 1398 | 1248 |
| Humanity's Last Exam | 8.6% | — |

## Multimodal

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 39.4 (#60)
- Gemma 3 12B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1240 | — |
| MindCube | — | 46.7% |

## Multilingual

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 52.3 (#86)
- Gemma 3 12B: 45.7 (#165)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1411 | 1318 |
| LMArena German | 1429 | 1370 |
| LMArena Russian | 1420 | 1335 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1461 | — |
| LMArena French | 1424 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1413 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1392 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1421 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 72.7 (#131)
- Gemma 3 12B: 68.6 (#186)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1377 | 1299 |

## Long Context

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 42.5 (#122)
- Gemma 3 12B: 40.0 (#162)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1394 | 1317 |

## Writing & Preference

- Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite: 60.9 (#94)
- Gemma 3 12B: 47.5 (#209)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite | Gemma 3 12B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1416 | 1334 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1401 | 1331 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1417 | 1334 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | — | 1126 |

## FAQ

### Is Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite better than Gemma 3 12B?

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.8 to 32.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 12B costs 7.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite 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; Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite lists at $0.25 and $1.50.

### Is Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite or Gemma 3 12B better for coding?

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 37.8 versus 31.7 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite does, with 1.05M tokens against 131K.

### How many benchmarks do Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite and Gemma 3 12B share?

21 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite has 38 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 3 12B has 24.