# Grok 3 vs Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct

> Grok 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.9 to 29.3 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/grok-3-vs-phi-3-small-8k-instruct
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 17

## Summary

- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Grok 3 scores higher in 7 categories and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct in 1 category; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Grok 3 leads 55.8 to 31.1.
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | xAI | Microsoft |
| Noometry Index | 39.9 | 29.3 |
| Rank | 157 | 314 |
| Context | — | — |
| Input $/M | — | — |
| Output $/M | — | — |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |

## Coding

- Grok 3: 41.9 (#115)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 27.9 (#318)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1432 | 1101 |
| Aider Polyglot | 53.3% | — |
| WeirdML | 37.2% | — |
| LiveBench Coding | — | 20.3% |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Grok 3: 30.5 (#76)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: —

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| BALROG | 29.5% | — |

## Reasoning

- Grok 3: 13.7 (#333)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 14.8 (#323)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1434 | 1100 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 0% | — |
| SimpleBench | 36.1% | — |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 61.3% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 5.5% | — |
| LiveBench Reasoning | — | 15.9% |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | — | 30.3% |
| Adversarial NLI | — | 58.1% |
| BIG-Bench Hard | — | 79.1% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 138.33 | — |
| HellaSwag | — | 77% |
| LiveBench | — | 24% |
| WinoGrande | — | 81.5% |

## Math

- Grok 3: 38.0 (#145)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 27.6 (#248)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1391 | 1151 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 55.6% | — |
| Omni-MATH | 46.4% | — |
| LiveBench Math | — | 17.6% |
| MATH Level 5 | 88.7% | — |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | 3.8% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | 0% | — |

## Knowledge

- Grok 3: 46.2 (#82)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 29.1 (#240)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1421 | 1067 |
| GPQA Diamond | 75.8% | — |
| MMLU-Pro | 78.8% | — |
| Confabulations | 14.2% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 5.8% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 65% | — |
| ARC (AI2) Challenge | — | 90.7% |
| MMLU | — | 75.7% |
| OpenBookQA | — | 88% |
| TriviaQA | — | 58.1% |

## Multilingual

- Grok 3: 52.3 (#87)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 28.5 (#272)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1410 | 1058 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1448 | 1061 |
| LMArena French | 1460 | 1135 |
| LMArena German | 1431 | 1080 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1387 | 966 |
| LMArena Korean | 1373 | 894 |
| LMArena Russian | 1416 | 1111 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1417 | 1111 |

## Instruction Following

- Grok 3: 75.0 (#73)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 51.9 (#292)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1409 | 1087 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | — | 47.2% |
| IFEval | 88.4% | — |

## Long Context

- Grok 3: 38.7 (#192)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 33.0 (#267)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1439 | 1088 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | 58.3% | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Grok 3: 55.8 (#141)
- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 31.1 (#284)

| Benchmark | Grok 3 | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1426 | 1110 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1414 | 1083 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1425 | 1068 |
| Short-Story Creative Writing | 76.4% | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1186 | — |
| WildBench | 84.9% | — |
| LiveBench Language | — | 12.9% |

## FAQ

### Is Grok 3 better than Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct?

Grok 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.9 to 29.3 on the Noometry Index.

### Is Grok 3 or Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct better for coding?

Grok 3 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 41.9 versus 27.9 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do Grok 3 and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Grok 3 has 40 scored results on Noometry and Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct has 32.