Model comparison

Gemma 2 27B vs Qwen3.5 397B-A17B

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.0 to 29.4 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 2 27B costs 2.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.5 397B-A17B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 22 shared benchmarks.

Gemma 2 27B Google

29.4

Rank #312 Confirmed

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B Alibaba (Qwen)

46.0

Rank #67 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 22 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 2 27B scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads 46.1 to 10.7.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 1.4% for Gemma 2 27B and 88.9% for Qwen3.5 397B-A17B.
  • Gemma 2 27B is cheaper at $0.65 / $0.65 per million input/output tokens, against $0.60 / $3.60 for Qwen3.5 397B-A17B.
  • Qwen3.5 397B-A17B accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 8K.

Side by side

Gemma 2 27B and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B specifications
Gemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
ProviderGoogleAlibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index29.446.0
Released2024-06-242026-02-01
WeightsOpenOpen
Context window8K262K
Max output2K66K
Input $ / M tokens$0.65$0.60
Output $ / M tokens$0.65$3.60
Results tracked3436

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Category by category

Coding Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 34.1 (#246), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 42.0 (#114)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Coding12111465
LMArena WebDev—1400
BigCodeBench Instruct42.8%—
LiveBench Coding36%—
BigCodeBench Complete52.5%—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Gemma 2 27B: —, Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 33.3 (#53)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
APEX-Agents—24.9%
τ²-bench Airline—81.5%
τ²-bench Banking—9.8%
τ²-bench Retail—84.4%
τ²-bench Telecom—97.8%

Reasoning Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 15.3 (#315), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 34.5 (#70)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Hard Prompts11981448
DTBench48%87.5%
LMCA7.1%37.9%
Epoch Capabilities Index122.08146.65
Kagi LLM Benchmark—73.7%
NYT Connections (extended)—58.9%
Chess Puzzles—13%
Thematic Generalization—65.1%
LiveBench Reasoning28.1%—
Mystery Game Puzzles—18%
LiveBench Data Analysis47.9%—
LiveBench38.2%—

Math Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 10.7 (#311), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 46.1 (#73)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-20251.4%88.9%
LMArena Math12121454
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)—31.2%
LiveBench Math26.5%—
MATH Level 527.9%—

Knowledge Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 19.0 (#280), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 53.3 (#58)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
GPQA Diamond36.5%86.4%
LMArena Expert11721462
Confabulations27.1%—
MMLU75.7%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Gemma 2 27B: —, Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 40.7 (#44)

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Vision—1263

Multilingual Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 38.6 (#226), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 53.7 (#59)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Non-English12171430
LMArena Chinese12211500
LMArena French12471461
LMArena German12091447
LMArena Japanese11751426
LMArena Korean11741384
LMArena Russian12341429
LMArena Spanish12281441

Instruction Following Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 60.5 (#249), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 75.0 (#77)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Instruction Following12061424
LiveBench Instruction Following58.1%—

Long Context Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 37.3 (#218), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 44.1 (#74)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Longer Query12311442

Writing & Preference Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads

Gemma 2 27B: 44.2 (#225), Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 62.3 (#79)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGemma 2 27BQwen3.5 397B-A17B
LMArena Text12311438
LMArena Creative Writing12411401
LMArena Multi-Turn12241446
EQ-Bench Creative Writing—1478
LiveBench Language32.6%—

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemma 2 27B better than Qwen3.5 397B-A17B?

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.0 to 29.4 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 2 27B costs 2.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.5 397B-A17B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Gemma 2 27B or Qwen3.5 397B-A17B?

Gemma 2 27B is cheaper. It lists at $0.65 per million input tokens and $0.65 per million output tokens; Qwen3.5 397B-A17B lists at $0.60 and $3.60.

Is Gemma 2 27B or Qwen3.5 397B-A17B better for coding?

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 42.0 versus 34.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B does, with 262K tokens against 8K.

How many benchmarks do Gemma 2 27B and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B share?

22 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 2 27B has 34 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B has 36.

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