# Granite 4.2 8B vs Kimi K2

> Side-by-side benchmark comparison for Granite 4.2 8B and Kimi K2 across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, multilingual, and math tasks.

- Canonical page: https://benchlm.ai/compare/granite-4-2-8b-vs-kimi-k2
- Last updated: October 15, 2026

- Shared sourced benchmarks: 6
- HTML indexing: indexable
- Ranking lane: BenchAlign v5.8

## Quick Verdict

Kimi K2 leads by point estimate. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence. Choose using the category evidence and your own workload tests.

## Summary

- Kimi K2 has the higher overall point estimate 33.5 to 33.4. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence.
- The clearest category separation is in instruction following, where the averages are 86.5 for Granite 4.2 8B and 48.4 for Kimi K2.
- The biggest single benchmark swing is AIME 2025 in Mathematics, with scores of 86.7% and 49.5%.
- Granite 4.2 8B is the cheaper option on output tokens, which matters if you expect large responses or heavy interactive use.

## Model Snapshot

| Property | Granite 4.2 8B | Kimi K2 |
|----------|----------|----------|
| Creator | IBM | Moonshot AI |
| Type | Open Weight | Proprietary |
| Reasoning | Reasoning | Non-Reasoning |
| Context | 128K | 128K |
| Overall Score | 33.4 | 33.5 |
| Benchmarks Covered | 14 | 13 |
| Pricing (input/output) | $0.00 / $0.00 | $0.60 / $2.50 |

## Category Breakdown

### Agentic

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 15.7 (Estimated · #113/127)
- Kimi K2 public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Kimi K2 | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 20.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| τ³-bench results | 58.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| BFCL v4 | 52.4% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

### Coding

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 17.2 (Estimated · #125/150)
- Kimi K2 public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Kimi K2 | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| SWE-bench Verified | 47.7% | 65.8% | Kimi K2 |
| SWE-bench Pro | 19.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE Multilingual | 30.8% | 47.3% | Kimi K2 |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 20.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| LiveCodeBench v6 | 73.2% | 53.7% | Granite 4.2 8B |
| SciCode | 36.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

### Reasoning

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 56.8 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)
- Kimi K2 public-lane score: 62.3 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)

### Knowledge

- Winner: Directional only
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 30.6 (Supported · #154/184)
- Kimi K2 public-lane score: 36.2 (Estimated · #129/184)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Kimi K2 | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| GPQA | 64.1% | 75.1% | Kimi K2 |
| MMLU-Pro | 74.0% | 81.1% | Kimi K2 |
| MMLU | Coming soon | 89.5% | Coming soon |
| SuperGPQA | Coming soon | 57.2% | Coming soon |
| SimpleQA | Coming soon | 31% | Coming soon |
| HLE | Coming soon | 4.7% | Coming soon |

### Instruction Following

- Winner: Directional only
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 86.5 (#41/146)
- Kimi K2 public-lane score: 48.4 (#94/146)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Kimi K2 | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| IFBench | 79.3% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| IFEval | Coming soon | 89.8% | Coming soon |

### Mathematics

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: Coming soon
- Kimi K2 public-lane score: 0 (#12/12)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Kimi K2 | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| AIME 2025 | 86.7% | 49.5% | Granite 4.2 8B |
| HMMT Feb 2025 | 78.3% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| AIME 2024 | Coming soon | 69.6% | Coming soon |
| MATH-500 | Coming soon | 97.4% | Coming soon |

## FAQ

### Which is better overall, Granite 4.2 8B or Kimi K2?

Kimi K2 has the higher overall point estimate. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence.

### Where is the biggest gap between Granite 4.2 8B and Kimi K2?

The widest category gap is in instruction following, where the averages are 86.5 for Granite 4.2 8B and 48.4 for Kimi K2.

### How many benchmarks does Granite 4.2 8B cover on BenchLM?

Granite 4.2 8B currently has 14 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

### How many benchmarks does Kimi K2 cover on BenchLM?

Kimi K2 currently has 13 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

## Related Comparisons

- [Granite 4.2 8B vs Granite 4.2 30B](/compare/granite-4-2-30b-vs-granite-4-2-8b)
- [Kimi K2 vs Granite 4.2 30B](/compare/granite-4-2-30b-vs-kimi-k2)
- [Granite 4.2 8B vs Granite 4.2 3B](/compare/granite-4-2-3b-vs-granite-4-2-8b)
- [Kimi K2 vs Granite 4.2 3B](/compare/granite-4-2-3b-vs-kimi-k2)

## Explore More

- [Granite 4.2 8B profile](/models/granite-4-2-8b)
- [Kimi K2 profile](/models/kimi-k2)
- [Compare Pricing](/llm-pricing)
- [Alternative Finder](/tools/alternative-finder)
- [LLM Selector](/tools/llm-selector)
- [Overall Rankings](/best/overall)