# GPT-4o mini vs Step 3

> Step 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.5 to 25.5 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gpt-4o-mini-vs-step-3
- Last updated: 2026-10-11
- Shared benchmarks: 17

## Summary

- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-4o mini scores higher in 0 categories and Step 3 in 9 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Step 3 leads 37.6 to 10.4.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is Kagi LLM Benchmark: 28.8% for GPT-4o mini and 62.3% for Step 3.
- Step 3 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | OpenAI | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 25.5 | 40.5 |
| Rank | 343 | 149 |
| Context | 128K | — |
| Input $/M | $0.15 | — |
| Output $/M | $0.60 | — |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |

## Coding

- GPT-4o mini: 22.0 (#335)
- Step 3: 40.1 (#147)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1290 | 1367 |
| Aider Polyglot | 3.6% | — |
| WeirdML | 11.8% | — |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 46.1% | — |
| LiveBench Coding | 43.1% | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 57.4% | — |
| HumanEval+ | 83.5% | — |
| MBPP+ | 72.2% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- GPT-4o mini: 27.5 (#101)
- Step 3: —

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| BALROG | 17.4% | — |

## Reasoning

- GPT-4o mini: 8.7 (#347)
- Step 3: 28.4 (#105)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 28.8% | 62.3% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1267 | 1355 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 0% | — |
| SimpleBench | 10.7% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 32.8% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 12% | — |
| DTBench | 54.4% | — |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 50% | — |
| LMCA | 10.4% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 126.56 | — |
| LiveBench | 41.3% | — |
| PIQA | 88.7% | — |

## Math

- GPT-4o mini: 10.4 (#314)
- Step 3: 37.6 (#148)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1267 | 1366 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 0.7% | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 6.9% | — |
| Omni-MATH | 28% | — |
| LiveBench Math | 36.3% | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 52.6% | — |
| GSM8K | 91.3% | — |

## Knowledge

- GPT-4o mini: 17.7 (#284)
- Step 3: 36.8 (#164)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1235 | 1333 |
| GPQA Diamond | 37.7% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 8.3% | — |
| MMLU-Pro | 60.3% | — |
| Confabulations | 37.2% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 36.8% | — |
| BoolQ | 88.7% | — |
| MMLU | 81.8% | — |

## Multimodal

- GPT-4o mini: 25.9 (#122)
- Step 3: 35.5 (#86)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1066 | 1177 |
| Video-MME | 64.8% | — |
| GeoBench | 64% | — |
| VPCT | 34% | — |

## Multilingual

- GPT-4o mini: 42.0 (#199)
- Step 3: 46.3 (#159)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1266 | 1327 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1265 | 1397 |
| LMArena German | 1272 | 1371 |
| LMArena Korean | 1195 | 1269 |
| LMArena Russian | 1275 | 1331 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1276 | 1371 |
| LMArena French | 1297 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1216 | — |

## Instruction Following

- GPT-4o mini: 61.9 (#239)
- Step 3: 70.4 (#164)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1258 | 1332 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 56.8% | — |
| IFEval | 78.2% | — |

## Long Context

- GPT-4o mini: 39.1 (#186)
- Step 3: 40.3 (#157)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1289 | 1326 |

## Writing & Preference

- GPT-4o mini: 39.5 (#248)
- Step 3: 54.3 (#151)

| Benchmark | GPT-4o mini | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1286 | 1350 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1268 | 1321 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1285 | 1341 |
| Short-Story Creative Writing | 67.2% | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 873 | — |
| WildBench | 79.1% | — |
| LiveBench Language | 28.6% | — |

## FAQ

### Is GPT-4o mini better than Step 3?

Step 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.5 to 25.5 on the Noometry Index.

### Is GPT-4o mini or Step 3 better for coding?

Step 3 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 22.0 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do GPT-4o mini and Step 3 share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-4o mini has 60 scored results on Noometry and Step 3 has 17.