Model comparison

Gemma 4 12B vs Kimi K2.5

Data verified July 23, 2026

Head-to-head evidence from 17 shared benchmark results across 7 categories. Overall scores shown here use the public BenchAlign v5 ranking lane.

Gemma 4 12B

Google

47.29/100

Margin

12.4pts

winning →

Kimi K2.5

Moonshot AI

59.66/100

2 category wins2 category wins

Public leaderboard positions: Gemma 4 12B #137 (Estimated); Kimi K2.5 #54 (Supported). Intervals and evidence labels describe ranking uncertainty, not a guarantee for a specific workload.

Evidence parity. Gemma 4 12B and Kimi K2.5 share 17 comparable benchmark results. 4 of 8 categories are comparable. 6 results are unique to Gemma 4 12B; 46 to Kimi K2.5.

Updated July 23, 2026

Shared results: 17
Gemma 4 12B only: 6
Kimi K2.5 only: 46
Comparable categories: 4 / 8

Pick Kimi K2.5 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Gemma 4 12B only becomes the better choice if knowledge is the priority or you want the stronger reasoning-first profile.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 17 shared benchmark results across 7 evidence categories; 4 of 8 categories currently have scoreable aggregates for both models. Treat the verdict as directional until coverage is more balanced.

Why this result

Kimi K2.5 is clearly ahead on the BenchAlign aggregate, 59.66 to 47.29. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

Kimi K2.5's sharpest advantage is in reasoning, where it averages 61 against 43.4. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is AIME26, 77.5% to 95.8%. Gemma 4 12B does hit back in knowledge, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.

Gemma 4 12B is the reasoning model in the pair, while Kimi K2.5 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.

Category breakdown

Exact category averages are shown below. Not measured means BenchLM does not have enough sourced public coverage for that model and category.

Category scores and score margins for Gemma 4 12B and Kimi K2.5
Category	Gemma 4 12B	Δ	Kimi K2.5
Knowledge	Gemma 4 12B77.5	Margin← 20.6	Kimi K2.556.9
Reasoning	Gemma 4 12B43.4	Margin→ 17.6	Kimi K2.561.0
Math	Gemma 4 12B77.5	Margin← 16.9	Kimi K2.560.6
Multimodal	Gemma 4 12B69.1	Margin→ 9.4	Kimi K2.578.5
Agentic	Gemma 4 12BNot measured	MarginNo overlap	Kimi K2.555.0
Coding	Gemma 4 12BNot measured	MarginNo overlap	Kimi K2.559.4
Multilingual	Gemma 4 12BNot measured	MarginNo overlap	Kimi K2.582.3
Inst. Following	Gemma 4 12BNot measured	MarginNo overlap	Kimi K2.593.9

Decisive benchmark drivers

The largest measured benchmark gaps in this matchup, with exact reported values.

A · Gemma 4 12BB · Kimi K2.5

AIME26
Math
Source ↗
A 77.5%B 95.8%
Winner: Kimi K2.5Δ 18.3
AIME26: Gemma 4 12B scored 77.5%; Kimi K2.5 scored 95.8%. Kimi K2.5 wins this benchmark.
MMLU-Pro
Knowledge
Source ↗
A 77.2%B 87.1%
Winner: Kimi K2.5Δ 9.9
MMLU-Pro: Gemma 4 12B scored 77.2%; Kimi K2.5 scored 87.1%. Kimi K2.5 wins this benchmark.
MMMU-Pro
Multimodal
Source ↗
A 69.1%B 78.5%
Winner: Kimi K2.5Δ 9.4
MMMU-Pro: Gemma 4 12B scored 69.1%; Kimi K2.5 scored 78.5%. Kimi K2.5 wins this benchmark.
GPQA
Knowledge
Source ↗
A 78.8%B 87.6%
Winner: Kimi K2.5Δ 8.8
GPQA: Gemma 4 12B scored 78.8%; Kimi K2.5 scored 87.6%. Kimi K2.5 wins this benchmark.

Operational comparison

Runtime and commercial metrics are compared only when both models have a complete sourced value.

Metric	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Comparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokens	Gemma 4 12BNot available	Kimi K2.5$0.6 input / $3 output	A complete price comparison is not available.
Generation speedtokens per second	Gemma 4 12BNot available	Kimi K2.545 tok/s	A complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first token	Gemma 4 12BNot available	Kimi K2.52.38 s	A complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokens	Gemma 4 12B256K	Kimi K2.5256K	Listed context windows are equal.

Benchmark Deep Dive

Agentic

19 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
τ²-bench resultsSource	36.3%	95.9%	Kimi K2.5 leads
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source	—	50.8%	Not comparable
BrowseCompSource	—	60.6%	Not comparable
Claw-EvalSource	—	52.3%	Not comparable
QwenClawBenchSource	—	54.3%	Not comparable
τ³-bench resultsSource	—	65.7%	Not comparable
DeepSearchQASource	—	77.1%	Not comparable
DeepPlanningSource	—	14.4%	Not comparable
ToolathlonSource	—	27.8%	Not comparable
MCP AtlasSource	—	29.5%	Not comparable
MCP-TasksSource	—	59.1%	Not comparable
WideResearchSource	—	72.7%	Not comparable
APEX-Agents-AASource	—	11.5%	Not comparable
Gert LabsSource	—	45.88%	Not comparable
ResearchClawBenchSource	—	14.0%	Not comparable
JobBenchSource	—	8.7%	Not comparable
AA Agentic IndexSource	—	21.7%	Not comparable
GDPval-AASource	—	25.4%	Not comparable
GDPval-AASource	—	1009	Not comparable

Coding

10 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
AA-SciCodeSource	38.2%	49.0%	Kimi K2.5 leads
SWE-bench VerifiedSource	—	76.8%	Not comparable
SWE-bench Verified*Source	—	70.8%	Not comparable
LiveCodeBench v6Source	—	85.0%	Not comparable
SWE-bench ProSource	—	50.7%	Not comparable
SWE MultilingualSource	—	73%	Not comparable
SWE-RebenchSource	—	58.5%	Not comparable
React Native EvalsSource	—	77.2%	Not comparable
SciCodeSource	—	48.7%	Not comparable
AA Coding IndexSource	—	46.8%	Not comparable

ReasoningKimi K2.5 wins

5 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
BBHSource	53%	—	Not comparable
MRCRv2Source	43.4%	—	Not comparable
AA-LCRSource	55.3%	65.3%	Kimi K2.5 leads
CritPtSource	0.0%	3.1%	Kimi K2.5 leads
LongBench v2Source	—	61%	Not comparable

KnowledgeGemma 4 12B wins

14 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
GPQASource	78.8%	87.6%	Kimi K2.5 leads
GPQA-DSource	78.8%	87.6%	Kimi K2.5 leads
MMLU-ProSource	77.2%	87.1%	Kimi K2.5 leads
HLE w/o toolsSource	5.2%	—	Not comparable
MMMLUSource	83.4%	—	Not comparable
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource	22.0%	35.4%	Kimi K2.5 leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource	75.3%	87.9%	Kimi K2.5 leads
AA-HLESource	14.8%	29.4%	Kimi K2.5 leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource	-51.9%	-8.1%	Kimi K2.5 leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource	16.0%	34.3%	Kimi K2.5 leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource	80.8%	64.6%	Kimi K2.5 leads
SuperGPQASource	—	69.2%	Not comparable
MMLU-Pro (Arcee)Source	—	87.1%	Not comparable
HLESource	—	30.1%	Not comparable

MathGemma 4 12B wins

9 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
AIME26Source	77.5%	95.8%	Kimi K2.5 leads
AIME 2025Source	—	96.1%	Not comparable
AIME25 (Arcee)Source	—	96.3%	Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2025Source	—	95.4%	Not comparable
HMMT Nov 2025Source	—	91.1%	Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2026Source	—	87.1%	Not comparable
MMAnswerBenchSource	—	81.8%	Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)Source	—	27.900%	Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4)Source	—	4.200%	Not comparable

Multilingual

2 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
MMLU-ProXSource	—	82.3%	Not comparable
NOVA-63Source	—	56.0%	Not comparable

MultimodalKimi K2.5 wins

8 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
MMMU-ProSource	69.1%	78.5%	Kimi K2.5 leads
MathVisionSource	79.7%	—	Not comparable
MedXpertQA (MM)Source	48.7%	—	Not comparable
AA-MMMU-ProSource	69.7%	75.4%	Kimi K2.5 leads
Video-MMESource	—	87.4%	Not comparable
MMVUSource	—	80.4%	Not comparable
VideoMMMUSource	—	86.6%	Not comparable
Design Arena WebsiteSource	—	1279	Not comparable

Inst. Following

2 benchmarks

Benchmark	Gemma 4 12B	Kimi K2.5	Result
AA-IFBenchSource	73.5%	70.2%	Gemma 4 12B leads
IFEvalSource	—	93.9%	Not comparable

Frequently Asked Questions (5)

Which is better, Gemma 4 12B or Kimi K2.5?

Kimi K2.5 is ahead on BenchLM's BenchAlign leaderboard, 59.66 to 47.29. The biggest single separator in this matchup is AIME26, where the scores are 77.5% and 95.8%.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, Gemma 4 12B or Kimi K2.5?

Gemma 4 12B has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 77.5 versus 56.9. Inside this category, AA-Omniscience Index is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, Gemma 4 12B or Kimi K2.5?

Gemma 4 12B has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 77.5 versus 60.6. Inside this category, AIME26 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for reasoning, Gemma 4 12B or Kimi K2.5?

Kimi K2.5 has the edge for reasoning in this comparison, averaging 61 versus 43.4. Inside this category, AA-LCR is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, Gemma 4 12B or Kimi K2.5?

Kimi K2.5 has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 78.5 versus 69.1. Inside this category, MMMU-Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Self-host vs API cost

Estimates at 50,000 req/day · 1000 tokens/req average.

Gemma 4 12B

API / mo$0

Self-host / moNot listed

Break-even—

Proprietary model — self-hosting not applicable.

Kimi K2.5

API / mo$2,700

Self-host / mo$5,221

Break-even132M/day

Model the full break-even

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Last updated: July 23, 2026

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