Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite vs MiniMax-M3
Which is better for the money: Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite by Google or MiniMax-M3 by MiniMax? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
MiniMax-M3 scores 13.6 points higher (29.2 vs 15.6) but costs 3.5× as much to run the benchmark ($538 vs $156; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick MiniMax-M3 when you need intelligence above 15.6, and Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite when 15.6 is enough.
| Metric | Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite | MiniMax-M3 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 15.6 | 29.2 | +87.2% MiniMax-M3 is 87.2% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $155.87 | $537.98 | +245.1% MiniMax-M3 is 3.5× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 6.15s | 25.47s | +314.1% MiniMax-M3 is 314.1% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.25 / $1.50 | $0.30 / $1.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image, Video |
MiniMax-M3 vs Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite: 87.2% more intelligence, 245.1% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 314.1% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Max) scores 38.10 for $122.
- MiniMax-M3 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (High) scores 50.20 for $521.
Gemini 3.1 Flash-LiteMiniMax-M3Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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