Model comparison

Kimi K2.5 vs Step 5 Preview

Kimi K2.5 and Step 5 Preview score almost the same on the Noometry Index (48.1 vs 47.9), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.

Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.

Kimi K2.5 Moonshot AI

48.1

Rank #57 Confirmed

Step 5 Preview StepFun

47.9

Rank #58 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Kimi K2.5 scores higher in 6 categories and Step 5 Preview in 3 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in knowledge, where Kimi K2.5 leads 53.6 to 41.2.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is CritPt: 3.1% for Kimi K2.5 and 20.9% for Step 5 Preview.
  • Kimi K2.5 is cheaper at $0.45 / $2.25 per million input/output tokens, against $1 / $2.70 for Step 5 Preview.
  • Step 5 Preview accepts more context: 1.02M tokens versus 262K.
  • Kimi K2.5 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Kimi K2.5 and Step 5 Preview specifications
Kimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
ProviderMoonshot AIStepFun
Noometry Index48.147.9
Released2026-01-272026-09-16
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window262K1.02M
Max output262K66K
Input $ / M tokens$0.45$1
Output $ / M tokens$2.25$2.70
Results tracked5118

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Category by category

Coding Step 5 Preview leads

Kimi K2.5: 48.8 (#53), Step 5 Preview: 51.8 (#36)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena WebDev14371564
SciCode49%58.9%
LMArena Coding14741480
SWE-bench Verified73.8%—
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)70.8%—
SWE-bench Multilingual67.3%—
WeirdML45.6%—
ALE-Bench821.65—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Kimi K2.5: 34.2 (#48), Step 5 Preview: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
Terminal-Bench43.2%—
OSWorld63.3%—
Vending-Bench 21,198—

Reasoning Step 5 Preview leads

Kimi K2.5: 31.2 (#80), Step 5 Preview: 40.0 (#57)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
CritPt3.1%20.9%
LMArena Hard Prompts14531465
ARC-AGI-211.8%—
SimpleBench46.8%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark78.5%—
NYT Connections (extended)69.9%—
ARC-AGI-165.3%—
Chess Puzzles12%—
EnigmaEval3.4%—
Thematic Generalization69.4%—
Epoch Capabilities Index148.03—

Math Kimi K2.5 leads

Kimi K2.5: 51.8 (#53), Step 5 Preview: 46.1 (#72)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Math14701470
MathArena Final-Answer Competitions62.3%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202592.2%—
ProofBench—42%
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)27.9%—
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)4.2%—

Knowledge Kimi K2.5 leads

Kimi K2.5: 53.6 (#56), Step 5 Preview: 41.2 (#112)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Expert14661470
GPQA Diamond87.6%—
Humanity's Last Exam24.4%—
SimpleQA Verified34.3%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate14.2%—

Multimodal Too close to call

Kimi K2.5: 41.1 (#39), Step 5 Preview: 41.0 (#41)

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Vision12691267
LMArena Document1430—

Multilingual Too close to call

Kimi K2.5: 53.9 (#53), Step 5 Preview: 53.8 (#54)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Non-English14331432
LMArena Chinese14951519
LMArena Russian14351436
LMArena Spanish14501439
LMArena French1454—
LMArena German1441—
LMArena Japanese1421—
LMArena Korean1410—

Instruction Following Too close to call

Kimi K2.5: 75.3 (#64), Step 5 Preview: 76.0 (#50)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Instruction Following14311444

Long Context Kimi K2.5 leads

Kimi K2.5: 52.1 (#7), Step 5 Preview: 44.5 (#64)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Longer Query14451455
Fiction.LiveBench86.1%—
CL-bench19.3%—
CL-bench Life13.2%—

Writing & Preference Kimi K2.5 leads

Kimi K2.5: 65.1 (#53), Step 5 Preview: 62.8 (#71)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkKimi K2.5Step 5 Preview
LMArena Text14451442
LMArena Creative Writing14231410
LMArena Multi-Turn14441447
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1579—

Frequently asked questions

Is Kimi K2.5 better than Step 5 Preview?

Kimi K2.5 and Step 5 Preview score almost the same on the Noometry Index (48.1 vs 47.9), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.

Which is cheaper, Kimi K2.5 or Step 5 Preview?

Kimi K2.5 is cheaper. It lists at $0.45 per million input tokens and $2.25 per million output tokens; Step 5 Preview lists at $1 and $2.70.

Is Kimi K2.5 or Step 5 Preview better for coding?

Step 5 Preview scores higher on coding benchmarks: 51.8 versus 48.8 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Step 5 Preview does, with 1.02M tokens against 262K.

How many benchmarks do Kimi K2.5 and Step 5 Preview share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Kimi K2.5 has 51 scored results on Noometry and Step 5 Preview has 18.

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