Noometry

Model comparison

Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct

Claude Sonnet 5.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.9 to 33.0 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 12 shared benchmarks.

Claude Sonnet 5.5 Anthropic

61.9

Rank #10 Confirmed

Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct Microsoft

33.0

Rank #250 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher in 8 categories and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads 87.9 to 33.4.
  • Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Claude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
ProviderAnthropicMicrosoft
Noometry Index61.933.0
Released2026-09-28—
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1M—
Max output128K—
Input $ / M tokens$2—
Output $ / M tokens$10—
Results tracked3217

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Category by category

Coding Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 67.3 (#6), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 32.9 (#268)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Coding15131130
FrontierCode52.1%—
CursorBench55.5%—
LMArena WebDev1774—
FrontierSWE61.9%—
SciCode61%—
ALE-Bench1,819—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 45.0 (#16), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: —

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
APEX-Agents75.5%—

Reasoning Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 54.0 (#28), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 21.7 (#214)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Hard Prompts14951127
NYT Connections (extended)80.5%—
CritPt31.4%—
Mystery Game Puzzles65%—
Epoch Capabilities Index165.03—

Math Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 87.9 (#6), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 33.4 (#202)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Math15101173
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)88.8%—
FrontierMath Tier 480.5%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025100%—
ProofBench100%—
FrontierMath Erdős2.9%—

Knowledge Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 66.0 (#12), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 30.2 (#229)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Expert15401108
GPQA Diamond95.6%—
SimpleQA Verified46.5%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 51.5 (#6), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: —

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Vision1289—
Furniture Assembly75%—

Multilingual Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 55.3 (#30), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 30.6 (#263)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Non-English14521094
LMArena Chinese15221108
LMArena Russian14511145
LMArena French—1110
LMArena German—1101
LMArena Japanese—1042
LMArena Korean—954
LMArena Spanish—1095

Instruction Following Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 78.3 (#11), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 57.6 (#268)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Instruction Following14951113

Long Context Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 45.9 (#28), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 34.0 (#255)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Longer Query14981120

Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 5.5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5.5: 66.0 (#40), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 34.1 (#272)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5.5Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Text14711138
LMArena Creative Writing14651107
LMArena Multi-Turn14741088

Frequently asked questions

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 better than Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.9 to 33.0 on the Noometry Index.

Is Claude Sonnet 5.5 or Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct better for coding?

Claude Sonnet 5.5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 67.3 versus 32.9 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 5.5 and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct share?

12 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 5.5 has 32 scored results on Noometry and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct has 17.

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