Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite vs Mercury 3
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and Mercury 3 are closely matched at 29.5 and 36.1 on the LLM Stats Score. Mercury 3 is 5.2x cheaper per token.
Google · Inception · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and Mercury 3 are closely matched on the overall LLM Stats Score at 29.5 and 36.1.
On price, Mercury 3 is roughly 5.2x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite also accepts a larger context window (1,048,576 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.
Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.
Choose Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite
- you process long inputs — it offers a 1,048,576 token context window
Choose Mercury 3
- cost matters — it's about 5.2x cheaper per token
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Oct 2026
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Individual benchmarks
6 reported for Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite · 12 for Mercury 3
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and Mercury 3don'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
Pricing Analysis
Price comparison per million tokens
For input processing, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite ($0.30/1M tokens) is 3.0x more expensive than Mercury 3 ($0.10/1M tokens).
For output processing, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite ($2.50/1M tokens) is 7.1x more expensive than Mercury 3 ($0.35/1M tokens).
In conclusion, Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is more expensive than Mercury 3.*
* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite accepts 1,048,576 input tokens compared to Mercury 3's 1,000,000 tokens. Mercury 3 can generate longer responses up to 131,072 tokens, while Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is limited to 65,536 tokens.
Input capabilities
Documented input modalities across available providers
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite supports multimodal inputs, whereas Mercury 3 does not.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite
Mercury 3
License
Usage and distribution terms
Both models are licensed under proprietary licenses.
Both models have usage restrictions defined by their respective organizations.
Proprietary
Closed source
Proprietary
Closed source
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite was released on 2026-07-21, while Mercury 3 was released on 2026-10-19.
Mercury 3 is 3 months newer than Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite.
Jul 21, 2026
3 months ago
Oct 19, 2026
3 days ago
3mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2026-03-31, while Mercury 3's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite's training data extends to 2026-03-31, but cannot make a direct comparison without Mercury 3's cutoff date.
Mar 2026
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Provider Availability
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is available from Google. Mercury 3 is available from Inception.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite
Mercury 3
Outputs Comparison
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite and Mercury 3 side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite vs Mercury 3.