Gemini 3 Flash vs Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

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

Gemini 3 Flash is clearly ahead on the aggregate, 62 to 36. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

Gemini 3 Flash's sharpest advantage is in multimodal & grounded, where it averages 79.6 against 33.4. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is MMMU-Pro, 80 to 28.

Gemini 3 Flash is also the more expensive model on tokens at $0.50 input / $3.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $0.00 input / $0.00 output per 1M tokens for Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning). That is roughly Infinityx on output cost alone. Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning) is the reasoning model in the pair, while Gemini 3 Flash is not. That usually helps on harder chain-of-thought-heavy tests, but it can also mean more latency and more token spend in real use. Gemini 3 Flash gives you the larger context window at 1M, compared with 128K for Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning).

Quick Verdict

Pick Gemini 3 Flash if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning) only becomes the better choice if you want the cheaper token bill or you want the stronger reasoning-first profile.

Agentic

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

57.5

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

38.5

56
Terminal-Bench 2.0
39
66
BrowseComp
41
53
OSWorld-Verified
36

Coding

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

40.4

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

15.2

62
HumanEval
24
44
SWE-bench Verified
17
36
LiveCodeBench
16
44
SWE-bench Pro
14

Multimodal & Grounded

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

79.6

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

33.4

80
MMMU-Pro
28
79
OfficeQA Pro
40

Reasoning

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

72

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

42.1

67
SimpleQA
32
65
MuSR
33
84
BBH
70
75
LongBench v2
44
76
MRCRv2
47

Knowledge

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

52.9

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

30

70
MMLU
30
69
GPQA
29
67
SuperGPQA
27
65
OpenBookQA
25
72
MMLU-Pro
54
6
HLE
5
65
FrontierScience
34

Instruction Following

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

85

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

70

85
IFEval
70

Multilingual

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

80.5

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

61.7

85
MGSM
63
78
MMLU-ProX
61

Mathematics

Gemini 3 Flash

Gemini 3 Flash

74

Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)

47.8

70
AIME 2023
33
72
AIME 2024
35
71
AIME 2025
34
66
HMMT Feb 2023
29
68
HMMT Feb 2024
31
67
HMMT Feb 2025
30
69
BRUMO 2025
32
80
MATH-500
67

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash is ahead overall, 62 to 36. The biggest single separator in this matchup is MMMU-Pro, where the scores are 80 and 28.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 52.9 versus 30. Inside this category, MMLU is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 40.4 versus 15.2. Inside this category, HumanEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 74 versus 47.8. Inside this category, AIME 2023 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for reasoning, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for reasoning in this comparison, averaging 72 versus 42.1. Inside this category, SimpleQA is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 57.5 versus 38.5. Inside this category, BrowseComp is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 79.6 versus 33.4. Inside this category, MMMU-Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 85 versus 70. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multilingual tasks, Gemini 3 Flash or Ministral 3 8B (Reasoning)?

Gemini 3 Flash has the edge for multilingual tasks in this comparison, averaging 80.5 versus 61.7. Inside this category, MGSM is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 12, 2026

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