Gemini 3 Flash vs GPT-4.1: which model should you choose?
We compared Gemini 3 Flash and GPT-4.1 on price, context window and 12 benchmarks. Gemini 3 Flash has the stronger average benchmark score; GPT-4.1 is cheaper on a blended 3:1 basis.
Gemini 3 Flash
Gemini 3 Flash is a multimodal model from Google DeepMind. It offers a 128,000-token context window, costs $15.67 per million input tokens and $70.15 per million output tokens, and averages 83.6 across the index's benchmark suite.
- Input
- $15.67 / 1M
- Output
- $70.15 / 1M
- Context
- 128,000
- Avg score
- 83.6
- Open weights
- No
GPT-4.1
GPT-4.1 is a multimodal model from OpenAI. It offers a 1,000,000-token context window, costs $15.71 per million input tokens and $64.52 per million output tokens, and averages 82.4 across the index's benchmark suite.
- Input
- $15.71 / 1M
- Output
- $64.52 / 1M
- Context
- 1,000,000
- Avg score
- 82.4
- Open weights
- No
Specification comparison
| Spec | Gemini 3 Flash | GPT-4.1 | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|
| Input price / 1M | $15.67 | $15.71 | A |
| Output price / 1M | $70.15 | $64.52 | B |
| Context window | 128,000 | 1,000,000 | B |
| Max output | 65,536 | 16,384 | A |
| Average score | 83.6 | 82.4 | A |
| Arena Elo | 1450.7 | 1432.4 | A |
| Open weights | No | No | Tie |
Benchmark comparison
Gemini 3 Flash wins 9, GPT-4.1 wins 3, and 0 benchmarks are tied. The table shows the modelled score for each model and the gap.
| Benchmark | Gemini 3 Flash | GPT-4.1 | Gap | Winner |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU-Pro | 83.7 | 86.2 | 2.5 | GPT-4.1 |
| GPQA Diamond | 80.3 | 76.1 | 4.2 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| SWE-bench Verified | 72.5 | 72.2 | 0.3 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| HumanEval | 86.2 | 88.3 | 2.1 | GPT-4.1 |
| MATH-500 | 89.0 | 86.8 | 2.2 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| AIME 2025 | 84.5 | 79.9 | 4.6 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| LiveCodeBench | 79.3 | 77.8 | 1.5 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| IFEval | 91.0 | 90.4 | 0.6 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| TruthfulQA | 84.8 | 81.8 | 3.0 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| HellaSwag | 89.8 | 90.3 | 0.5 | GPT-4.1 |
| MMMU | 78.2 | 76.3 | 1.9 | Gemini 3 Flash |
| Arena Elo | 1450.7 | 1432.4 | 18.3 | Gemini 3 Flash |
Price analysis
On a blended 3:1 input-to-output basis, Gemini 3 Flash costs about $29.29 per million tokens and GPT-4.1 costs about $27.91. GPT-4.1 is roughly 5% cheaper than Gemini 3 Flash. At high volume, that gap compounds quickly, so price should carry real weight unless the quality difference is decisive.
GPT-4.1 has the larger context window at 1,000,000 tokens, compared with 128,000 for Gemini 3 Flash. That matters for long documents, large codebases and multi-step agent traces.
Verdict
Across 12 shared benchmarks, Gemini 3 Flash wins 9, GPT-4.1 wins 3, and 0 are tied. On the index average, Gemini 3 Flash leads GPT-4.1 by 1.2 points (83.6 versus 82.4).
The price picture favours GPT-4.1. The context picture favours GPT-4.1. Those two dimensions often matter more than a few benchmark points once a model is good enough for the task.
If you need a single default, start with Gemini 3 Flash for quality-sensitive work and GPT-4.1 for high-volume, well-scoped tasks. Run both on a sample of your own traffic before locking in a choice.
Choose Gemini 3 Flash if
- You want the higher average benchmark score in this index.
- You need the larger 65,536-token output limit.
Choose GPT-4.1 if
- Unit cost matters and you want the cheaper blended price.
- You need the larger 1,000,000-token context window.
FAQ
Is Gemini 3 Flash better than GPT-4.1?
On the index average, Gemini 3 Flash leads GPT-4.1 by 1.2 points (83.6 versus 82.4). The better choice depends on price, context and your task. Gemini 3 Flash wins 9 benchmarks, GPT-4.1 wins 3.
Which is cheaper, Gemini 3 Flash or GPT-4.1?
GPT-4.1 is cheaper on a blended 3:1 basis at about $27.91 per million tokens, versus $29.29 for Gemini 3 Flash.
Which has the larger context window?
GPT-4.1 has the larger context window at 1,000,000 tokens. Gemini 3 Flash has 128,000 tokens.
Are these models open weights?
Gemini 3 Flash is proprietary; GPT-4.1 is proprietary.
Which should I choose for production?
If you need a single default, start with Gemini 3 Flash for quality-sensitive work and GPT-4.1 for high-volume, well-scoped tasks. Run both on a sample of your own traffic before locking in a choice.