Noometry

Model comparison

Claude Opus 4.8 vs Qwen3 Max

Claude Opus 4.8 is the stronger model overall, scoring 60.7 to 43.7 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3 Max costs 4.2× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Opus 4.8's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 30 shared benchmarks.

Claude Opus 4.8 Anthropic

60.7

Rank #13 Confirmed

Qwen3 Max Alibaba (Qwen)

43.7

Rank #87 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 30 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Opus 4.8 scores higher in 8 categories and Qwen3 Max in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Claude Opus 4.8 leads 64.7 to 22.6.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3): 80% for Claude Opus 4.8 and 18.9% for Qwen3 Max.
  • Qwen3 Max is cheaper at $1.20 / $6 per million input/output tokens, against $5 / $25 for Claude Opus 4.8.
  • Claude Opus 4.8 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 262K.

Side by side

Claude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
ProviderAnthropicAlibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index60.743.7
Released2026-05-282025-09-23
WeightsProprietaryProprietary
Context window1M262K
Max output128K66K
Input $ / M tokens$5$1.20
Output $ / M tokens$25$6
Results tracked6533

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Category by category

Coding Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 59.9 (#12), Qwen3 Max: 43.0 (#93)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
LMArena Coding14901456
ALE-Bench1,564370.45
DeepSWE59%—
FrontierCode46.5%—
LMArena WebDev1556—
SciCode53.5%—
GSO47.1%—
WeirdML82.9%—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Claude Opus 4.8: 47.6 (#11), Qwen3 Max: —

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
Vending-Bench 25,78771.56
APEX-Agents48.9%—
OSWorld 2.020.6%—
Remote Labor Index8.3%—
τ²-bench Banking39.7%—
DeepResearch Bench50.2%—
PostTrainBench33.8%—
GBAEval70.9%—
GDP.pdf24%—
LMArena Search1204—

Reasoning Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 64.7 (#16), Qwen3 Max: 22.6 (#190)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
Kagi LLM Benchmark88.8%72.5%
NYT Connections (extended)91.1%30.1%
Chess Puzzles34%4%
LMArena Hard Prompts14821448
Mystery Game Puzzles36%5%
DTBench94.9%82.1%
LMCA57.5%28.3%
Epoch Capabilities Index158.21142.38
ARC-AGI-272.1%—
SimpleBench64.8%—
ARC-AGI-192.5%—
CritPt20.9%—
EnigmaEval23.5%—
EBR-Bench28.6%—
Surface Evolver Bench87.5%—
Bench to the Future 30.14—
ForecastBench59.9—

Math Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 78.4 (#13), Qwen3 Max: 38.7 (#131)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)80%18.9%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202598.3%73.3%
LMArena Math14871446
FrontierMath Tier 456.1%—
MathArena Final-Answer Competitions91.8%—
ProofBench69%—
MATH Level 5—97.1%
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)47.2%—
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)31.3%—

Knowledge Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 61.3 (#29), Qwen3 Max: 48.1 (#78)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
GPQA Diamond91%72.6%
SimpleQA Verified53%48.7%
LMArena Expert15021455

Multimodal Not comparable

Claude Opus 4.8: 42.9 (#26), Qwen3 Max: —

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
LMArena Vision1294—
Blueprint-Bench 214.5%—
Furniture Assembly42.5%—
LMArena Document1475—

Multilingual Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 55.2 (#33), Qwen3 Max: 53.7 (#62)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
LMArena Non-English14501429
LMArena Chinese15071478
LMArena French14811449
LMArena German14721463
LMArena Japanese14401397
LMArena Korean14321399
LMArena Russian14741428
LMArena Spanish14661462

Instruction Following Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 77.4 (#24), Qwen3 Max: 74.8 (#87)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
LMArena Instruction Following14761419

Long Context Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 45.4 (#35), Qwen3 Max: 41.6 (#134)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
LMArena Longer Query14831438
Fiction.LiveBench—66.7%
CL-bench—14.5%

Writing & Preference Claude Opus 4.8 leads

Claude Opus 4.8: 72.0 (#16), Qwen3 Max: 62.4 (#76)

BenchmarkClaude Opus 4.8Qwen3 Max
LMArena Text14611439
LMArena Creative Writing14541402
LMArena Multi-Turn14761446
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1840—
EQ-Bench 41281—

Frequently asked questions

Is Claude Opus 4.8 better than Qwen3 Max?

Claude Opus 4.8 is the stronger model overall, scoring 60.7 to 43.7 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3 Max costs 4.2× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Opus 4.8's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Claude Opus 4.8 or Qwen3 Max?

Qwen3 Max is cheaper. It lists at $1.20 per million input tokens and $6 per million output tokens; Claude Opus 4.8 lists at $5 and $25.

Is Claude Opus 4.8 or Qwen3 Max better for coding?

Claude Opus 4.8 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 59.9 versus 43.0 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Claude Opus 4.8 does, with 1M tokens against 262K.

How many benchmarks do Claude Opus 4.8 and Qwen3 Max share?

30 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Opus 4.8 has 65 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3 Max has 33.

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