# MiniMax M3 vs Spark-X2.6-4B

> Side-by-side benchmark comparison for MiniMax M3 and Spark-X2.6-4B across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, multilingual, and math tasks.

- Canonical page: https://benchlm.ai/compare/minimax-m3-vs-spark-x2-6-4b
- Last updated: October 20, 2026

- Shared sourced benchmarks: 5
- HTML indexing: indexable
- Ranking lane: BenchAlign v5.8

## Quick Verdict

MiniMax M3 leads by point estimate. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence. Choose using the category evidence and your own workload tests.

## Summary

- MiniMax M3 has the higher overall point estimate 54.98 to 40.14. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence.
- The clearest category separation is in reasoning, where the averages are 82 for MiniMax M3 and 48.8 for Spark-X2.6-4B.
- The biggest single benchmark swing is BrowseComp in Agentic, with scores of 83.5% and 53.1%.
- Spark-X2.6-4B is the cheaper option on output tokens, which matters if you expect large responses or heavy interactive use.

## Model Snapshot

| Property | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B |
|----------|----------|----------|
| Creator | MiniMax | SparkLLM |
| Type | Open Weight | Open Weight |
| Reasoning | Non-Reasoning | Reasoning |
| Context | 1M | 1M |
| Overall Score | 54.98 | 40.14 |
| Benchmarks Covered | 28 | 20 |
| Pricing (input/output) | $0.30 / $1.20 | $0.00 / $0.00 |

## Category Breakdown

### Agentic

- Winner: Directional only
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: 39.2 (Supported · #70/131)
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: 33 (Estimated · #89/131)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 66.0% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| BrowseComp | 83.5% | 53.1% | MiniMax M3 |
| OSWorld-Verified | 70.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| MCP Atlas | 74.2% | 62.4% | MiniMax M3 |
| Claw-Eval | 74.5% | 69.9% | MiniMax M3 |
| BankerToolBench | 76.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| ResearchClawBench | 19.8% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| OSWorld 2.0 | 4.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals) | 53.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| MazeBench | 0% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| BFCL v4 | Coming soon | 71.8% | Coming soon |
| τ²-bench results | Coming soon | 86.9% | Coming soon |
| HLE w/ tools | Coming soon | 36.9% | Coming soon |
| τ³-bench results | Coming soon | 34.7% | Coming soon |

### Coding

- Winner: Directional only
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: 37 (Supported · #74/152)
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: 30.6 (Estimated · #95/152)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| SWE-bench Verified | 80.5% | 62.8% | MiniMax M3 |
| SWE-bench Pro | 59% | 54.3% | MiniMax M3 |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 66.0% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| NL2Repo | 42.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| VIBE V2 | 50.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SVG-Bench | 63.7% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| KernelBench Hard | 28.8% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| OpenHarmony Bench | 48.4% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals) | 82.2% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE-bench (Vals) | 75.0% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE Multilingual | Coming soon | 64.7% | Coming soon |
| SciCode | Coming soon | 36.8% | Coming soon |

### Reasoning

- Winner: Not comparable
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: 82 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: 48.8 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| LongBench v2 | Coming soon | 53.3% | Coming soon |

### Multimodal & Grounded

- Winner: Not comparable
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: 60 (#44/55)
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| OfficeQA Pro | 45.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| OmniDocBench 1.5 | 91.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| MMMU-Pro | 78.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| VideoMMMU | 84.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| Video-MME (with subtitle) | 85.4% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

### Knowledge

- Winner: Directional only
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: 51.6 (Supported · #76/187)
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: 43 (Estimated · #109/187)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| GPQA Diamond (Vals) | 92.7% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| MMLU-Pro (Vals) | 84.2% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| GPQA-D | Coming soon | 77.1% | Coming soon |
| HLE w/o tools | Coming soon | 17.9% | Coming soon |
| GPQA | Coming soon | 69.9% | Coming soon |

### Instruction Following

- Winner: Directional only
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: 93.8 (#5/149)
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: 78.2 (#62/149)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| IFEval | Coming soon | 93.6% | Coming soon |
| IFBench | Coming soon | 75.8% | Coming soon |

### Mathematics

- Winner: Not comparable
- MiniMax M3 public-lane score: Coming soon
- Spark-X2.6-4B public-lane score: 76.4 (Unranked · 3 rankable rows)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M3 | Spark-X2.6-4B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| USAMO 2026 | 85.7% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| AIME26 | Coming soon | 91.2% | Coming soon |
| HMMT Feb 2026 | Coming soon | 81.3% | Coming soon |
| IMOAnswerBench | Coming soon | 75.2% | Coming soon |

## FAQ

### Which is better overall, MiniMax M3 or Spark-X2.6-4B?

MiniMax M3 has the higher overall point estimate. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence.

### Where is the biggest gap between MiniMax M3 and Spark-X2.6-4B?

The widest category gap is in reasoning, where the averages are 82 for MiniMax M3 and 48.8 for Spark-X2.6-4B.

### How many benchmarks does MiniMax M3 cover on BenchLM?

MiniMax M3 currently has 28 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

### How many benchmarks does Spark-X2.6-4B cover on BenchLM?

Spark-X2.6-4B currently has 20 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

## Related Comparisons

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- [Spark-X2.6-4B vs Claude Opus 5.5](/compare/claude-opus-5-5-vs-spark-x2-6-4b)
- [MiniMax M3 vs GPT-6.1 Sol](/compare/gpt-6-1-sol-vs-minimax-m3)
- [Spark-X2.6-4B vs GPT-6.1 Sol](/compare/gpt-6-1-sol-vs-spark-x2-6-4b)

## Explore More

- [MiniMax M3 profile](/models/minimax-m3)
- [Spark-X2.6-4B profile](/models/spark-x2-6-4b)
- [Compare Pricing](/llm-pricing)
- [Alternative Finder](/tools/alternative-finder)
- [LLM Selector](/tools/llm-selector)
- [Overall Rankings](/best/overall)