# Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct vs Step 3

> Step 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.9 to 27.4 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/phi-3-mini-4k-instruct-vs-step-3
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 15

## Summary

- They share 15 benchmarks with published results for both. Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct scores higher in 0 categories and Step 3 in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Step 3 leads 54.5 to 27.7.

## Snapshot

| | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Microsoft | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 27.4 | 39.9 |
| Rank | 324 | 145 |
| Context | — | — |
| Input $/M | — | — |
| Output $/M | — | — |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 26.1 (#319)
- Step 3: 39.5 (#144)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1093 | 1367 |
| LiveBench Coding | 15.5% | — |
| HumanEval+ | 59.1% | — |
| MBPP+ | 54.2% | — |

## Reasoning

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 13.6 (#326)
- Step 3: 27.6 (#102)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1072 | 1355 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 62.3% |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 26.8% | — |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 34.7% | — |
| Adversarial NLI | 52.8% | — |
| BIG-Bench Hard | 71.7% | — |
| HellaSwag | 76.7% | — |
| LiveBench | 22.4% | — |
| WinoGrande | 70.8% | — |

## Math

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 24.5 (#258)
- Step 3: 34.9 (#148)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1111 | 1366 |
| LiveBench Math | 15.7% | — |

## Knowledge

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 27.9 (#241)
- Step 3: 36.2 (#161)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1045 | 1333 |
| ARC (AI2) Challenge | 84.9% | — |
| MMLU | 68.8% | — |
| OpenBookQA | 88% | — |
| TriviaQA | 64% | — |

## Multimodal

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: —
- Step 3: 34.9 (#81)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | — | 1176 |

## Multilingual

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 26.5 (#275)
- Step 3: 46.5 (#154)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1021 | 1327 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1021 | 1396 |
| LMArena German | 1044 | 1371 |
| LMArena Korean | 905 | 1271 |
| LMArena Russian | 1022 | 1331 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1084 | 1372 |
| LMArena French | 1075 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 935 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 48.0 (#298)
- Step 3: 70.6 (#159)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1053 | 1332 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 39.1% | — |

## Long Context

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 31.7 (#271)
- Step 3: 40.3 (#152)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1044 | 1326 |

## Writing & Preference

- Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct: 27.7 (#295)
- Step 3: 54.5 (#146)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct | Step 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1073 | 1351 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1037 | 1322 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1018 | 1340 |
| LiveBench Language | 9.2% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct better than Step 3?

Step 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.9 to 27.4 on the Noometry Index.

### Is Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct or Step 3 better for coding?

Step 3 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.5 versus 26.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct and Step 3 share?

15 benchmarks have published results for both models. Phi 3 Mini 4k Instruct has 35 scored results on Noometry and Step 3 has 17.