The AI arena is free today

Open Superagent

DeepSeek VL2 Small vs MiniMax M3.1 Flash

MiniMax M3.1 Flash leads the LLM Stats Score 48.5 to 0.9.

DeepSeek · MiniMax · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash leads the overall LLM Stats Score 48.5 to 0.9, ranking #29 overall.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose DeepSeek VL2 Small

  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

Choose MiniMax M3.1 Flash

  • overall performance matters — it scores 48.5 and ranks #29 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning — it leads those capability indexes
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Oct 2026

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

DeepSeek VL2 Small
DeepSeek
MiniMax M3.1 Flash
MiniMax
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
0.9
#345
48.5
#29
Reasoning
-4.3
#363
45.8
#34
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
—
—
Input price
— / M
$0.15 / M
Output price
— / M
$0.60 / M
Context window
—
1,000,000

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

2 shared
Index
DeepSeek VL2 Small
MiniMax M3.1 Flash
Vision
0.5#198
28.8#42
Multimodal
3.0#161
30.2#38
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

14 reported for DeepSeek VL2 Small · 14 for MiniMax M3.1 Flash

No common benchmarks found

DeepSeek VL2 Small and MiniMax M3.1 Flashdon't have any common benchmark datasets to compare. They may have been evaluated on different testing suites.

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only MiniMax M3.1 Flash specifies input context (1,000,000 tokens). Only MiniMax M3.1 Flash specifies output context (524,288 tokens).

DeepSeek
DeepSeek VL2 Small
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
MiniMax
MiniMax M3.1 Flash
Input1,000,000 tokens
Output524,288 tokens
Tue Oct 20 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Both DeepSeek VL2 Small and MiniMax M3.1 Flash support multimodal inputs.

They are both capable of processing various types of data, offering versatility in application.

DeepSeek VL2 Small

Text
Images
Audio
Video

MiniMax M3.1 Flash

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

DeepSeek VL2 Small is licensed under deepseek, while MiniMax M3.1 Flash uses a proprietary license.

License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.

DeepSeek VL2 Small

deepseek

Open weights

MiniMax M3.1 Flash

Proprietary

Closed source

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

DeepSeek VL2 Small was released on 2024-12-13, while MiniMax M3.1 Flash was released on 2026-10-19.

MiniMax M3.1 Flash is 23 months newer than DeepSeek VL2 Small.

DeepSeek VL2 Small

Dec 13, 2024

1.9 years ago

MiniMax M3.1 Flash

Oct 19, 2026

1 days ago

1.8yr newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against DeepSeek VL2 Small and MiniMax M3.1 Flash side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

DeepSeek VL2 Small
✓ Preferred
MiniMax M3.1 Flash
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about DeepSeek VL2 Small vs MiniMax M3.1 Flash.

Which is better, DeepSeek VL2 Small or MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

MiniMax M3.1 Flash leads the LLM Stats Score 48.5 to 0.9. DeepSeek VL2 Small is made by DeepSeek and MiniMax M3.1 Flash is made by MiniMax. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does DeepSeek VL2 Small compare to MiniMax M3.1 Flash in benchmarks?

DeepSeek VL2 Small scores DocVQA: 92.3%, ChartQA: 84.5%, OCRBench: 83.4%, TextVQA: 83.4%, MMBench: 80.3%. MiniMax M3.1 Flash scores BabyVision: 91.0%, CharXiv-R: 82.5%, CyberGym: 82.2%, BankerToolBench: 76.2%, DeepSWE 1.1: 73.7%.

What are the context window sizes for DeepSeek VL2 Small and MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

DeepSeek VL2 Small supports an unknown number of tokens and MiniMax M3.1 Flash supports 1.0M tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between DeepSeek VL2 Small and MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (0.9 vs 48.5), licensing (deepseek vs Proprietary). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes DeepSeek VL2 Small and MiniMax M3.1 Flash?

DeepSeek VL2 Small is developed by DeepSeek and MiniMax M3.1 Flash is developed by MiniMax.

Related comparisons