o3-mini vs Llama 4 Maverick

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

o3-mini is clearly ahead on the aggregate, 56 to 42. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

o3-mini's sharpest advantage is in knowledge, where it averages 82.1 against 38.7. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is MMLU, 86.9 to 46.

o3-mini is also the more expensive model on tokens at $1.10 input / $4.40 output per 1M tokens, versus $0.00 input / $0.00 output per 1M tokens for Llama 4 Maverick. That is roughly Infinityx on output cost alone. o3-mini is the reasoning model in the pair, while Llama 4 Maverick 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. Llama 4 Maverick gives you the larger context window at 1M, compared with 200K for o3-mini.

Quick Verdict

Pick o3-mini if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Llama 4 Maverick only becomes the better choice if you want the cheaper token bill or you need the larger 1M context window.

Knowledge

o3-mini

o3-mini

82.1

Llama 4 Maverick

38.7

86.9
MMLU
46
77.2
GPQA
45
-
SuperGPQA
43
-
OpenBookQA
41
-
MMLU-Pro
53
-
HLE
4

Coding

o3-mini

o3-mini

49.3

Llama 4 Maverick

22

49.3
SWE-bench Verified
13
-
HumanEval
38
-
LiveCodeBench
15

Mathematics

o3-mini

o3-mini

87.3

Llama 4 Maverick

46.8

87.3
AIME 2024
48
-
AIME 2023
46
-
AIME 2025
47
-
HMMT Feb 2023
42
-
HMMT Feb 2024
44
-
HMMT Feb 2025
43
-
BRUMO 2025
45
-
MATH-500
59

Reasoning

Llama 4 Maverick
-
SimpleQA
44
-
MuSR
42
-
BBH
63

Instruction Following

o3-mini

o3-mini

93.9

Llama 4 Maverick

68

93.9
IFEval
68

Multilingual

Llama 4 Maverick
-
MGSM
63

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, o3-mini or Llama 4 Maverick?

o3-mini is ahead overall, 56 to 42. The biggest single separator in this matchup is MMLU, where the scores are 86.9 and 46.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, o3-mini or Llama 4 Maverick?

o3-mini has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 82.1 versus 38.7. Inside this category, MMLU is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, o3-mini or Llama 4 Maverick?

o3-mini has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 49.3 versus 22. Inside this category, SWE-bench Verified is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, o3-mini or Llama 4 Maverick?

o3-mini has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 87.3 versus 46.8. Inside this category, AIME 2024 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, o3-mini or Llama 4 Maverick?

o3-mini has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 93.9 versus 68. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 9, 2026

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