# Benchmarking Multimodal Mathematical Reasoning with Explicit Visual Dependency

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2504.18589 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.18589/

## Key facts

- Cited by 11 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Multimodal reasoning, one of 17 directions in LLM reasoning.
- Builds on 24 of its 47 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 24 Apr 2025.

## Placed in

- LLM reasoning / [Multimodal reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/lr/multimodal-reasoning/)
- Multimodal LLMs / vision-language models / [VLM benchmarks and visual reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/mllm/vlm-benchmarks-and-visual-reasoning/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 24 of 24)

- [Microsoft COCO: Common Objects in Context](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1405.0312/) (2014)
- [Chain-of-Thought Prompting Elicits Reasoning in Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.11903/) (2022)
- [Training Verifiers to Solve Math Word Problems](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2110.14168/) (2021)
- [GPT-4o System Card](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.21276/) (2024)
- [VQA: Visual Question Answering](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1505.00468/) (2015)
- [Qwen-VL: A Versatile Vision-Language Model for Understanding, Localization, Text Reading, and Beyond](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2308.12966/) (2023)
- [Gemma 3 Technical Report](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2503.19786/) (2025)
- [MathVista: Evaluating Mathematical Reasoning of Foundation Models in Visual Contexts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.02255/) (2023)
- [LLaVA-NeXT-Interleave: Tackling Multi-image, Video, and 3D in Large Multimodal Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.07895/) (2024)
- [Kimi-VL Technical Report](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2504.07491/) (2025)
- [G-LLaVA: Solving Geometric Problem with Multi-Modal Large Language Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.11370/) (2023)
- [Exploring the Reasoning Abilities of Multimodal Large Language Models (MLLMs): A Comprehensive Survey on Emerging Trends in Multimodal Reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2401.06805/) (2024)
- [Math-LLaVA: Bootstrapping Mathematical Reasoning for Multimodal Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2406.17294/) (2024)
- [MathBench: Evaluating the Theory and Application Proficiency of LLMs with a Hierarchical Mathematics Benchmark](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2405.12209/) (2024)
- [CMATH: Can Your Language Model Pass Chinese Elementary School Math Test?](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2306.16636/) (2023)
- [ErrorRadar: Benchmarking Complex Mathematical Reasoning of Multimodal Large Language Models Via Error Detection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.04509/) (2024)
- [MMIE: Massive Multimodal Interleaved Comprehension Benchmark for Large Vision-Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.10139/) (2024)
- [MV-MATH: Evaluating Multimodal Math Reasoning in Multi-Visual Contexts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.20808/) (2025)
- [Mathematical Language Models: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2312.07622/) (2023)
- [U-MATH: A University-Level Benchmark for Evaluating Mathematical Skills in LLMs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2412.03205/) (2024)
- [Defining and Evaluating Visual Language Models' Basic Spatial Abilities: A Perspective from Psychometrics](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2502.11859/) (2025)
- [Polymath: A Challenging Multi-modal Mathematical Reasoning Benchmark](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2410.14702/) (2024)
- [MathGLM-Vision: Solving Mathematical Problems with Multi-Modal Large Language Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2409.13729/) (2024)
- [NTSEBENCH: Cognitive Reasoning Benchmark for Vision Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.10380/) (2024)

## Built on by (most cited first, 11 of 11)

- [Perception, Reason, Think, and Plan: A Survey on Large Multimodal Reasoning Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.04921/) (2025)
- [MathCanvas: Intrinsic Visual Chain-of-Thought for Multimodal Mathematical Reasoning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.14958/) (2025)
- [A Survey of Deep Learning for Geometry Problem Solving](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2507.11936/) (2025)
- [MathReal: We Keep It Real! A Real Scene Benchmark for Evaluating Math Reasoning in Multimodal Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2508.06009/) (2025)
- [Plane Geometry Problem Solving with Multi-modal Reasoning: A Survey](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2505.14340/) (2025)
- [VisTIRA: Closing the Image-Text Modality Gap in Visual Math Reasoning via Structured Tool Integration](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.14440/) (2026)
- [GeoThought: A Dataset for Enhancing Mathematical Geometry Reasoning in Vision-Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2510.21881/) (2025)
- [VAMPS: Visual-Assisted Mathematical Problem Solving Benchmark](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.04244/) (2026)
- [V-REX: Benchmarking Exploratory Visual Reasoning via Chain-of-Questions](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2512.11995/) (2025)
- [Representing Visual Evidence for Item Difficulty Prediction: Visual Textualization and Image-Native Modeling](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2608.04554/) (2026)
- [MVGraph: Benchmarking LVLMs on Evidence Composition across Multi-View Visual Graph](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2610.12961/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Recent advancements in Large Vision-Language Models (LVLMs) have significantly enhanced their ability to integrate visual and linguistic information, achieving near-human proficiency in tasks like object recognition, captioning, and visual question answering. However, current benchmarks typically focus on knowledge-centric evaluations that assess domain-specific expertise, often neglecting the core ability to reason about fundamental mathematical elements and visual concepts. We identify a gap in evaluating elementary-level math problems, which rely on explicit visual dependencies-requiring models to discern, integrate, and reason across multiple images while incorporating commonsense knowledge, all of which are crucial for advancing toward broader AGI capabilities. To address this gap, we introduce VCBENCH, a comprehensive benchmark for multimodal mathematical reasoning with explicit visual dependencies. VCBENCH includes 1,720 problems across six cognitive domains, featuring 6,697 images (averaging 3.9 per question) to ensure multi-image reasoning. We evaluate 26 state-of-the-art LVLMs on VCBENCH, revealing substantial performance disparities, with even the top models unable to exceed 50% accuracy. Our findings highlight the ongoing challenges in visual-mathematical integration and suggest avenues for future LVLM advancements. The project can be found at https://alibaba-damo-academy.github.io/VCBench/.