Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview vs Kimi K2.5
GoogleMoonshot AIboth via one key, provider price + 3%
Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview (Google, released 2026-02-19) and Kimi K2.5 (Moonshot AI, released 2026-01-27) are both recent multimodal reasoning models, but they're built for different budgets. Gemini has a 1,048,576-token context window and mandatory reasoning; Kimi tops out at 262,144 tokens with reasoning enabled by default but optional. The gap that matters most for planning is price: Gemini's input tokens cost 5.33x what Kimi's do. Both run on OpenKey with one API key and a flat 3% fee on top of provider list price.
Spec vs spec
| Spec | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Kimi K2.5 |
|---|---|---|
| Context window | 1.0M | 262K |
| Max output | 66K | — |
| Input modalities | audio, file, image, text, video | text, image |
| Output modalities | text | text |
| Released | Feb 19, 2026 | Jan 27, 2026 |
| Reasoning | always on | optional |
Pricing
Per 1M tokens. Provider price plus the flat 3% fee — the sum is what you pay.
google/gemini-3.1-pro-preview
Input · 1M tokens
$2.00 + 3%$2.06
Output · 1M tokens
$12.00 + 3%$12.36
Cache read · 1M tokens
$0.200 + 3%$0.206
Cache write · 1M tokens
$0.375 + 3%$0.386
FEE — FLAT, EVERY MODEL3%
moonshotai/kimi-k2.5
Input · 1M tokens
$0.375 + 3%$0.386
Output · 1M tokens
$2.02 + 3%$2.09
FEE — FLAT, EVERY MODEL3%
One workload, priced on both
10M input + 2M output tokens at each model's price, flat 3% fee included.
google/gemini-3.1-pro-preview
$45.32
$44.00 provider + 3%
moonshotai/kimi-k2.5Cheaper
$8.03
$7.80 provider + 3%
Benchmarks
Design Arena categories where both models have results. Higher Elo and lower rank win.
| Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Kimi K2.5 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Category | Elo | Rank | Elo | Rank |
| 3D | 1303 | #17 | 1286 | #22 |
| androidnative | 1059 | #25 | 1132 | #17 |
| ASCII art | 1314 | #4 | 1214 | #17 |
| Code | 1290 | #18 | 1286 | #20 |
| Data viz | 1270 | #20 | 1270 | #21 |
| Full-stack | 1139 | #16 | 1182 | #14 |
| Game dev | 1264 | #26 | 1272 | #23 |
| godotgamedev | 1220 | #6 | 1254 | #2 |
| Mobile apps | 1176 | #22 | 1186 | #20 |
| SVG | 1347 | #2 | 1210 | #25 |
| UI components | 1322 | #8 | 1290 | #19 |
| Web apps | 1196 | #13 | 1194 | #15 |
| Websites | 1294 | #15 | 1291 | #16 |
Head-to-head preference voting. How we filter and rank
Pricing math
Provider list price: Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview is $2.00/M input, $12.00/M output. Kimi K2.5 is $0.375/M input, $2.025/M output. On OpenKey, add the flat 3% fee: Gemini becomes $2.00 x 1.03 = $2.06/M input and $12.00 x 1.03 = $12.36/M output. Kimi becomes $0.375 x 1.03 = $0.38625/M input and $2.025 x 1.03 = $2.08575/M output.
Run the numbers on a realistic workload — 10M input tokens, 2M output tokens — and Gemini costs $44.00 versus Kimi's $7.80. That's a 5.33x input price ratio. If you're calling either model at scale (agent loops, batch document processing), that gap adds up fast. Gemini also caches at $0.20/M read and $0.375/M write; Kimi's provider doesn't expose cache pricing in this catalog.
Coding and agent benchmarks
On Design Arena's agent categories, Gemini leads in the categories where design output quality is judged directly: agentichtmlslides (rank 5, 1226 elo) and htmlslides (rank 6, 1209 elo) versus Kimi's fullstack (rank 14, 1182 elo) and webapps (rank 15, 1194 elo). Gemini also ranks higher on the model-level SVG category (rank 2, 1347 elo vs Kimi's rank 25, 1210 elo) and uicomponent (rank 8, 1322 elo vs Kimi's rank 19, 1290 elo).
Kimi does edge out Gemini on godotgamedev (rank 2, 1254 elo vs Gemini's rank 6, 1220 elo) and androidnative (rank 17, 1132 elo vs Gemini's rank 25, 1059 elo) — both game/mobile agent categories. On dataviz the two are effectively tied at 1270 elo, with Gemini at rank 20 and Kimi at rank 21 — not a meaningful gap either way. Artificial Analysis scores Gemini's coding index at 68.8 and agentic index at 21.4; no comparable Artificial Analysis numbers are published for Kimi in this catalog.
Context and long-document work
Gemini's 1,048,576-token context is 4x Kimi's 262,144 tokens. For tasks that need to hold an entire codebase, a long contract, or a multi-hour transcript in context at once, Gemini has real headroom that Kimi doesn't. Gemini also supports a larger max output (65,536 tokens) versus Kimi, which has no stated max completion limit in this catalog. If your workload chunks documents anyway, Kimi's 262,144-token window is still large enough for most single-file or multi-file review tasks — you just hit the ceiling sooner on huge inputs.
Modality differences
Gemini accepts audio, file, image, text, and video as input — it's the broader multimodal model here. Kimi accepts text and image only. If your pipeline needs to process audio transcripts, video frames, or arbitrary file uploads directly, Gemini is the only option of the two. Both models output text only. Gemini's reasoning is mandatory with three effort levels (high, medium, low, defaulting to medium); Kimi's reasoning is optional and enabled by default, giving you a toggle Gemini doesn't offer.
Which model for which job
| Use case | Pick | Why |
|---|---|---|
| High-volume agent loops (thousands of calls/day) | Kimi K2.5 | $7.80 vs $44.00 on the same 10M-in/2M-out workload |
| UI/SVG generation and design review | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | SVG rank 2 (1347 elo) and uicomponent rank 8 (1322 elo) vs Kimi's rank 25 and rank 19 |
| Processing audio, video, or file uploads directly | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Only Gemini accepts audio, video, and file inputs; Kimi is text+image only |
| Ingesting a full codebase or very long document in one call | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | 1,048,576-token context is 4x Kimi's 262,144 |
| Godot or Android game-dev agent tasks | Kimi K2.5 | godotgamedev rank 2 (1254 elo) and androidnative rank 17 (1132 elo) beat Gemini's rank 6 and rank 25 |
| Cost-sensitive fullstack agent tasks | Kimi K2.5 | fullstack elo of 1182 at roughly a fifth of Gemini's input price |
Questions
- Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview or Kimi K2.5?
- Kimi K2.5, by a wide margin. Provider list price is $0.375/M input and $2.025/M output versus Gemini's $2.00/M input and $12.00/M output — a 5.33x gap on input tokens. On a 10M-input/2M-output workload, Kimi costs $7.80 total versus Gemini's $44.00.
- Does Kimi K2.5 beat Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview on any benchmark?
- Yes — Kimi ranks higher on godotgamedev (rank 2, 1254 elo vs Gemini's rank 6, 1220 elo) and androidnative (rank 17, 1132 elo vs Gemini's rank 25, 1059 elo). On dataviz they're roughly tied at 1270 elo (Gemini rank 20, Kimi rank 21).
- Which model has a bigger context window?
- Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview, at 1,048,576 tokens versus Kimi K2.5's 262,144 tokens — a 4x difference. Gemini also supports a larger max output at 65,536 tokens; Kimi has no stated max completion limit in this catalog.
- Can both models process images and audio?
- Both accept image input, but only Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview handles audio, video, and file inputs directly. Kimi K2.5 is limited to text and image input, with text-only output for both models.