Model comparison

o3-mini vs Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct

o3-mini is the stronger model overall, scoring 36.7 to 32.4 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.

o3-mini OpenAI

36.7

Rank #205 Confirmed

Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct Microsoft

32.4

Rank #246 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. o3-mini scores higher in 5 categories and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct in 3 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in instruction following, where o3-mini leads 75.3 to 57.8.
  • Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

o3-mini and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct specifications
o3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
ProviderOpenAIMicrosoft
Noometry Index36.732.4
Released2024-12-20—
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window200K—
Max output100K—
Input $ / M tokens$1.10—
Output $ / M tokens$4.40—
Results tracked5117

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Category by category

Coding o3-mini leads

o3-mini: 41.4 (#116), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 32.3 (#263)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Coding13781130
Aider Polyglot60.4%—
SciCode39.8%—
GSO1.3%—
WeirdML43.7%—
LiveBench Coding82.7%—
CadEval54%—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

o3-mini: 29.3 (#79), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
Cybench22.5%—

Reasoning Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct leads

o3-mini: 16.3 (#295), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 20.8 (#214)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Hard Prompts13661127
ARC-AGI-23%—
SimpleBench22.8%—
ARC-AGI-134.5%—
CritPt0.3%—
Chess Puzzles17%—
LiveBench Reasoning89.6%—
Mystery Game Puzzles7%—
DTBench68.8%—
LiveBench Data Analysis70.6%—
LMCA19%—
Epoch Capabilities Index140.35—
ForecastBench59.6—
LiveBench75.9%—

Math Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct leads

o3-mini: 27.6 (#236), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 30.9 (#202)

Math benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Math13961173
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)18.6%—
FrontierMath Tier 40%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202576.9%—
LiveBench Math77.3%—
MATH Level 596.5%—
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)12.4%—
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)4.2%—

Knowledge o3-mini leads

o3-mini: 38.3 (#135), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 29.6 (#226)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Expert13641108
GPQA Diamond77%—
SimpleQA Verified15.3%—
Confabulations17.9%—

Multilingual o3-mini leads

o3-mini: 45.9 (#159), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 30.8 (#258)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Non-English13191094
LMArena Chinese13791108
LMArena French13331109
LMArena German13031101
LMArena Japanese12861042
LMArena Korean1314954
LMArena Russian13041145
LMArena Spanish13211095

Instruction Following o3-mini leads

o3-mini: 75.3 (#67), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 57.8 (#263)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Instruction Following13381114
LiveBench Instruction Following84.4%—

Long Context Too close to call

o3-mini: 33.8 (#251), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 33.9 (#250)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Longer Query13431120
Fiction.LiveBench50%—

Writing & Preference o3-mini leads

o3-mini: 50.4 (#177), Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct: 34.3 (#267)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmarko3-miniPhi 3 Medium 4k Instruct
LMArena Text13371138
LMArena Creative Writing12861106
LMArena Multi-Turn13201088
Short-Story Creative Writing61.7%—
LiveBench Language50.7%—

Frequently asked questions

Is o3-mini better than Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct?

o3-mini is the stronger model overall, scoring 36.7 to 32.4 on the Noometry Index.

Is o3-mini or Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct better for coding?

o3-mini scores higher on coding benchmarks: 41.4 versus 32.3 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do o3-mini and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. o3-mini has 51 scored results on Noometry and Phi 3 Medium 4k Instruct has 17.

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