Gemini 2.5 Pro vs Step 3.5 Flash

Side-by-side benchmark comparison across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, and math workflows.

Gemini 2.5 Pro finishes one point ahead overall, 67 to 66. That is enough to call, but not enough to treat as a blowout. This matchup comes down to a few meaningful edges rather than one model dominating the board.

Gemini 2.5 Pro's sharpest advantage is in multimodal & grounded, where it averages 85.1 against 66.7. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is MMMU-Pro, 86 to 64. Step 3.5 Flash does hit back in coding, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.

Gemini 2.5 Pro is also the more expensive model on tokens at $1.25 input / $5.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $0.10 input / $0.30 output per 1M tokens for Step 3.5 Flash. That is roughly 16.7x on output cost alone. Gemini 2.5 Pro gives you the larger context window at 1M, compared with 256K for Step 3.5 Flash.

Quick Verdict

Pick Gemini 2.5 Pro if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Step 3.5 Flash only becomes the better choice if coding is the priority or you want the cheaper token bill.

Agentic

Gemini 2.5 Pro

Gemini 2.5 Pro

61.7

Step 3.5 Flash

60.2

61
Terminal-Bench 2.0
62
72
BrowseComp
66
55
OSWorld-Verified
54

Coding

Step 3.5 Flash

Gemini 2.5 Pro

41

Step 3.5 Flash

47.1

75
HumanEval
77
45
SWE-bench Verified
48
37
LiveCodeBench
45
44
SWE-bench Pro
49

Multimodal & Grounded

Gemini 2.5 Pro

Gemini 2.5 Pro

85.1

Step 3.5 Flash

66.7

86
MMMU-Pro
64
84
OfficeQA Pro
70

Reasoning

Gemini 2.5 Pro

Gemini 2.5 Pro

80.7

Step 3.5 Flash

78.3

81
SimpleQA
82
79
MuSR
82
81
BBH
83
80
LongBench v2
74
83
MRCRv2
73

Knowledge

Step 3.5 Flash

Gemini 2.5 Pro

58.4

Step 3.5 Flash

60.8

83
MMLU
84
83
GPQA
83
81
SuperGPQA
81
79
OpenBookQA
79
76
MMLU-Pro
76
3
HLE
12
70
FrontierScience
71

Instruction Following

Step 3.5 Flash

Gemini 2.5 Pro

83

Step 3.5 Flash

87

83
IFEval
87

Multilingual

Step 3.5 Flash

Gemini 2.5 Pro

82.7

Step 3.5 Flash

82.8

84
MGSM
86
82
MMLU-ProX
81

Mathematics

Step 3.5 Flash

Gemini 2.5 Pro

83.5

Step 3.5 Flash

84.5

84
AIME 2023
85
86
AIME 2024
87
85
AIME 2025
86
80
HMMT Feb 2023
81
82
HMMT Feb 2024
83
81
HMMT Feb 2025
82
83
BRUMO 2025
84
84
MATH-500
85

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Gemini 2.5 Pro is ahead overall, 67 to 66. The biggest single separator in this matchup is MMMU-Pro, where the scores are 86 and 64.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Step 3.5 Flash has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 60.8 versus 58.4. Inside this category, HLE is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Step 3.5 Flash has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 47.1 versus 41. Inside this category, LiveCodeBench is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Step 3.5 Flash has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 84.5 versus 83.5. Inside this category, AIME 2023 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for reasoning, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Gemini 2.5 Pro has the edge for reasoning in this comparison, averaging 80.7 versus 78.3. Inside this category, MRCRv2 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Gemini 2.5 Pro has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 61.7 versus 60.2. Inside this category, BrowseComp is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Gemini 2.5 Pro has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 85.1 versus 66.7. Inside this category, MMMU-Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Step 3.5 Flash has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 87 versus 83. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multilingual tasks, Gemini 2.5 Pro or Step 3.5 Flash?

Step 3.5 Flash has the edge for multilingual tasks in this comparison, averaging 82.8 versus 82.7. Inside this category, MGSM is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 12, 2026

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