Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) vs MiniMax-M3
Which is better for the money: Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) by Google or MiniMax-M3 by MiniMax? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-11-02.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) scores 39.0 points higher (57.7 vs 18.7) but costs 6.7× as much to run the benchmark ($5903 vs $878; flagship vs premium cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) when you need intelligence above 18.7, and MiniMax-M3 when 18.7 is enough.
| Metric | Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) | MiniMax-M3 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 57.7 | 18.7 | −67.6% MiniMax-M3 is 67.6% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $5,903.03 | $878.03 | −85.1% MiniMax-M3 is 85.1% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | Not reported | 21.59s | — not comparable |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.30 / $1.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image, Video |
MiniMax-M3 vs Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium): 67.6% less intelligence, 85.1% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and end-to-end time not fully reported.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) is on today's frontier: nothing is both smarter and cheaper.
- MiniMax-M3 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 52.30 for $718.
Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium)MiniMax-M3Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/gemini-4-carbon-medium/minimax-m3 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gemini-4-carbon-medium/minimax-m3?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill