# Kimi K3 vs Yi-Lightning

> Kimi K3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 59.5 to 37.1 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/kimi-k3-vs-yi-lightning
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 17

## Summary

- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Kimi K3 scores higher in 8 categories and Yi-Lightning in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Kimi K3 leads 74.2 to 36.2.
- Kimi K3 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Moonshot AI | 01.AI |
| Noometry Index | 59.5 | 37.1 |
| Rank | 15 | 209 |
| Context | 1.05M | — |
| Input $/M | $3 | — |
| Output $/M | $15 | — |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Kimi K3: 61.0 (#10)
- Yi-Lightning: 27.4 (#320)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1508 | 1312 |
| DeepSWE | 68.5% | — |
| FrontierCode | 44.2% | — |
| Aider Polyglot | — | 12.9% |
| LMArena WebDev | 1654 | — |
| FrontierSWE | 25.9% | — |
| SciCode | 59.5% | — |
| WeirdML | 82.6% | — |
| ALE-Bench | 1,524 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Kimi K3: 41.8 (#20)
- Yi-Lightning: —

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| APEX-Agents | 50.6% | — |
| τ²-bench Banking | 37.1% | — |
| PostTrainBench | 32% | — |
| GBAEval | 48.3% | — |
| GDP.pdf | 19% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 5,165 | — |

## Reasoning

- Kimi K3: 63.0 (#17)
- Yi-Lightning: 25.9 (#139)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1496 | 1302 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 60.4% | — |
| SimpleBench | 60.7% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 93.6% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 94.5% | — |
| CritPt | 23.4% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 39% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 26% | — |
| DTBench | 91.2% | — |
| LMCA | 52.7% | — |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 95% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 157.45 | — |
| ForecastBench | 61.1 | — |

## Math

- Kimi K3: 74.2 (#16)
- Yi-Lightning: 36.2 (#172)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1491 | 1300 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 72.2% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 39% | — |
| MathArena Final-Answer Competitions | 87.8% | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 97.2% | — |
| ProofBench | 87% | — |

## Knowledge

- Kimi K3: 63.2 (#21)
- Yi-Lightning: 35.4 (#185)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1521 | 1286 |
| GPQA Diamond | 93.1% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 50.6% | — |

## Multimodal

- Kimi K3: 37.8 (#70)
- Yi-Lightning: —

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | 29.5% | — |
| Furniture Assembly | 34.2% | — |

## Multilingual

- Kimi K3: 56.3 (#21)
- Yi-Lightning: 42.2 (#196)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1466 | 1269 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1529 | 1320 |
| LMArena French | 1491 | 1305 |
| LMArena German | 1488 | 1267 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1487 | 1228 |
| LMArena Korean | 1458 | 1192 |
| LMArena Russian | 1482 | 1255 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1472 | 1315 |

## Instruction Following

- Kimi K3: 77.7 (#14)
- Yi-Lightning: 67.4 (#196)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1483 | 1278 |

## Long Context

- Kimi K3: 45.8 (#29)
- Yi-Lightning: 39.4 (#181)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1494 | 1297 |

## Writing & Preference

- Kimi K3: 76.6 (#4)
- Yi-Lightning: 50.2 (#184)

| Benchmark | Kimi K3 | Yi-Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1476 | 1302 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1454 | 1280 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1488 | 1311 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 2082 | — |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1339 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Kimi K3 better than Yi-Lightning?

Kimi K3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 59.5 to 37.1 on the Noometry Index.

### Is Kimi K3 or Yi-Lightning better for coding?

Kimi K3 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 61.0 versus 27.4 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do Kimi K3 and Yi-Lightning share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Kimi K3 has 53 scored results on Noometry and Yi-Lightning has 18.