Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash has the lowest input price. Per 1M input tokens: Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite from $0.30 and MiniMax M3.1 Flash from $0.15.

Which has the larger context window, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite has the largest context window: Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite 1,048,576 tokens and MiniMax M3.1 Flash 1,000,000 tokens.

Which is smarter, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash scores highest on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index: Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite 11.7 and MiniMax M3.1 Flash 28.9.

Can I switch between Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and MiniMax M3.1 Flash without changing my code?

Yes. All of them are served through FastRouter's OpenAI-compatible API, so switching is a change of the model parameter (google/gemini-3.5-flash-lite, minimax/minimax-m3.1-flash).

Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite vs MiniMax M3.1 Flash

Side-by-side pricing per provider, context window, benchmark scores and speed, all on one OpenAI-compatible API.

Estimate monthly cost for these models

Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite Googlegoogle/gemini-3.5-flash-lite

MiniMax M3.1 Flash Minimaxminimax/minimax-m3.1-flash

Creator

Google

Minimax

Released

Jul 21, 2026

Oct 19, 2026

Context window

1.05M

Max output

66K

524K

Input / 1MLowest provider price

$0.30

$0.15

Output / 1MLowest provider price

$2.50

$0.60

Providers

IntelligenceArtificial Analysis index

11.7

28.9

LatencyMedian time to first token

1.4s

—

ThroughputMedian tokens per second

<1 t/s

—

Accepts

Text, Image, Audio, Video, Files

Text, Image, Video

Produces

Text

Tool calling

Yes

Structured output

Yes

Reasoning

Yes

Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite vs MiniMax M3.1 Flash: summary

Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and MiniMax M3.1 Flash are both available through FastRouter's OpenAI-compatible API, so switching between them is a change of model id, not a new integration.

Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite, from Google, has a 1,048,576-token context window, costs from $0.30/1M input and $2.50/1M output tokens across 2 providers and scores 11.7 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.

MiniMax M3.1 Flash, from Minimax, has a 1,000,000-token context window, costs $0.15/1M input and $0.60/1M output tokens and scores 28.9 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.

MiniMax M3.1 Flash is the cheapest on input, 2× cheaper than the next model, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite has the largest context window and MiniMax M3.1 Flash scores highest for intelligence.

Switch with one line

client = OpenAI(base_url="https://api.fastrouter.ai/api/v1", api_key="<FASTROUTER_API_KEY>") client.chat.completions.create(model="google/gemini-3.5-flash-lite", messages=[...]) # or client.chat.completions.create(model="minimax/minimax-m3.1-flash", messages=[...])

Full API docs

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Benchmark scores sourced from ArtificialAnalysis