# Grok 4.5 vs MiniMax-M2.1

> Grok 4.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 55.0 to 38.4 on the Noometry Index. MiniMax-M2.1 costs 5.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Grok 4.5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/grok-4-5-vs-minimax-m2-1
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 20

## Summary

- They share 20 benchmarks with published results for both. Grok 4.5 scores higher in 9 categories and MiniMax-M2.1 in 0 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Grok 4.5 leads 56.0 to 15.8.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is NYT Connections (extended): 79.9% for Grok 4.5 and 11.2% for MiniMax-M2.1.
- MiniMax-M2.1 is cheaper at $0.30 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $6 for Grok 4.5.
- Grok 4.5 accepts more context: 500K tokens versus 205K.
- MiniMax-M2.1 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | xAI | MiniMax |
| Noometry Index | 55.0 | 38.4 |
| Rank | 22 | 177 |
| Context | 500K | 205K |
| Input $/M | $2 | $0.30 |
| Output $/M | $6 | $1.20 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |

## Coding

- Grok 4.5: 51.7 (#34)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 40.1 (#132)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena WebDev | 1552 | 1384 |
| LMArena Coding | 1473 | 1421 |
| ALE-Bench | 1,309 | 623.83 |
| DeepSWE | 53.8% | — |
| FrontierCode | 42.4% | — |
| SciCode | 54.1% | — |
| WeirdML | 46.4% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Grok 4.5: 44.4 (#15)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 27.7 (#91)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | — | 36.6% |
| APEX-Agents | 56.2% | — |
| τ²-bench Banking | 47.9% | — |
| PostTrainBench | 23.4% | — |
| GBAEval | 65.4% | — |
| GDP.pdf | 14% | — |
| LMArena Search | 1213 | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 3,887 | — |

## Reasoning

- Grok 4.5: 56.0 (#23)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 15.8 (#301)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| NYT Connections (extended) | 79.9% | 11.2% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1462 | 1410 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 52.6% | — |
| SimpleBench | 70% | — |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 83.5% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 87.2% | — |
| CritPt | 15.4% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 36% | — |
| DTBench | 96.5% | — |
| LMCA | 45.2% | — |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 74.4% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 154.02 | — |

## Math

- Grok 4.5: 60.7 (#29)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 35.6 (#142)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1457 | 1396 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 57.2% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 24.4% | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 97.8% | — |
| ProofBench | 31% | — |

## Knowledge

- Grok 4.5: 62.3 (#21)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 37.7 (#143)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1466 | 1432 |
| GPQA Diamond | 93.4% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 48.3% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 11.8% |

## Multimodal

- Grok 4.5: 37.8 (#63)
- MiniMax-M2.1: —

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1287 | — |
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | 27.3% | — |
| Furniture Assembly | 22.5% | — |
| LMArena Document | 1452 | — |

## Multilingual

- Grok 4.5: 54.5 (#43)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 50.2 (#123)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1439 | 1378 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1497 | 1430 |
| LMArena French | 1458 | 1405 |
| LMArena German | 1448 | 1380 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1425 | 1287 |
| LMArena Korean | 1402 | 1297 |
| LMArena Russian | 1447 | 1386 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1452 | 1396 |

## Instruction Following

- Grok 4.5: 76.3 (#45)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 74.0 (#108)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1446 | 1399 |

## Long Context

- Grok 4.5: 44.8 (#54)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 43.2 (#98)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1463 | 1416 |

## Writing & Preference

- Grok 4.5: 65.9 (#40)
- MiniMax-M2.1: 58.5 (#114)

| Benchmark | Grok 4.5 | MiniMax-M2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1448 | 1392 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1442 | 1362 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1457 | 1396 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1579 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Grok 4.5 better than MiniMax-M2.1?

Grok 4.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 55.0 to 38.4 on the Noometry Index. MiniMax-M2.1 costs 5.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Grok 4.5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Grok 4.5 or MiniMax-M2.1?

MiniMax-M2.1 is cheaper. It lists at $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; Grok 4.5 lists at $2 and $6.

### Is Grok 4.5 or MiniMax-M2.1 better for coding?

Grok 4.5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 51.7 versus 40.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Grok 4.5 does, with 500K tokens against 205K.

### How many benchmarks do Grok 4.5 and MiniMax-M2.1 share?

20 benchmarks have published results for both models. Grok 4.5 has 52 scored results on Noometry and MiniMax-M2.1 has 22.