Model comparison
Gemma 3 4B vs Qwen3.6 Plus
Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.5 to 28.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 4B costs 23× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.6 Plus's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 18 shared benchmarks.
Google
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 18 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 3 4B scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.6 Plus in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3.6 Plus leads 56.1 to 11.8.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 7.5% for Gemma 3 4B and 93.3% for Qwen3.6 Plus.
- Gemma 3 4B is cheaper at $0.04 / $0.08 per million input/output tokens, against $0.50 / $3 for Qwen3.6 Plus.
- Qwen3.6 Plus accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 131K.
- Gemma 3 4B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Alibaba (Qwen) | |
| Noometry Index | 28.1 | 47.5 |
| Released | 2025-03-12 | 2026-03-31 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | 131K | 1M |
| Max output | 4K | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.04 | $0.50 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.08 | $3 |
| Results tracked | 22 | 37 |
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Category by category
Coding Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 35.9 (#215), Qwen3.6 Plus: 40.8 (#130)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1230 | 1467 |
| SWE-bench Verified | — | 57.9% |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1461 |
| SciCode | — | 40.7% |
| ALE-Bench | — | 670.15 |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Gemma 3 4B: 20.9 (#142), Qwen3.6 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 19.6% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 5,115 |
Reasoning Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 13.2 (#335), Qwen3.6 Plus: 29.3 (#93)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | 17% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1253 | 1449 |
| DTBench | 50.9% | 81.9% |
| LMCA | 2.8% | 33.1% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 116.02 | 147.65 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 25.2% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 60.3% |
| CritPt | — | 2.9% |
| Thematic Generalization | — | 59.5% |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 12% |
Math Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 16.8 (#292), Qwen3.6 Plus: 51.8 (#54)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 7.5% | 93.3% |
| LMArena Math | 1239 | 1450 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 38.2% |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 26.2% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | — | 8.3% |
Knowledge Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 11.8 (#299), Qwen3.6 Plus: 56.1 (#45)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 23.2% | 88.4% |
| LMArena Expert | 1223 | 1454 |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 44.1% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 6.4% | — |
Multilingual Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 42.5 (#194), Qwen3.6 Plus: 53.3 (#70)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1273 | 1424 |
| LMArena German | 1281 | 1452 |
| LMArena Russian | 1294 | 1434 |
| LMArena Chinese | — | 1477 |
| LMArena French | — | 1455 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1389 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1379 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1432 |
Instruction Following Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 65.2 (#225), Qwen3.6 Plus: 75.0 (#74)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1239 | 1425 |
Long Context Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 38.7 (#194), Qwen3.6 Plus: 45.2 (#49)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1273 | 1439 |
| CL-bench | — | 20.3% |
Writing & Preference Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Gemma 3 4B: 42.0 (#239), Qwen3.6 Plus: 62.2 (#82)
| Benchmark | Gemma 3 4B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1291 | 1437 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1271 | 1404 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1255 | 1438 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1068 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Gemma 3 4B better than Qwen3.6 Plus?
Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.5 to 28.1 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 4B costs 23× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.6 Plus's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Gemma 3 4B or Qwen3.6 Plus?
Gemma 3 4B is cheaper. It lists at $0.04 per million input tokens and $0.08 per million output tokens; Qwen3.6 Plus lists at $0.50 and $3.
Is Gemma 3 4B or Qwen3.6 Plus better for coding?
Qwen3.6 Plus scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.8 versus 35.9 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3.6 Plus does, with 1M tokens against 131K.
How many benchmarks do Gemma 3 4B and Qwen3.6 Plus share?
18 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 3 4B has 22 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Plus has 37.