Model comparison

GLM-5 vs Qwen3.6 Flash

GLM-5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.1 to 38.8 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.6 Flash costs 3.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GLM-5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 8 shared benchmarks.

GLM-5 Z.ai (Zhipu)

46.1

Rank #66 Confirmed

Qwen3.6 Flash Alibaba (Qwen)

38.8

Rank #182 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 8 benchmarks with published results for both. GLM-5 scores higher in 2 categories and Qwen3.6 Flash in 1 category; 3 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in knowledge, where GLM-5 leads 52.3 to 42.1.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is SimpleBench: 53.2% for GLM-5 and 35.2% for Qwen3.6 Flash.
  • Qwen3.6 Flash is cheaper at $0.19 / $1.13 per million input/output tokens, against $1 / $3.20 for GLM-5.
  • Qwen3.6 Flash accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 205K.
  • GLM-5 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GLM-5 and Qwen3.6 Flash specifications
GLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
ProviderZ.ai (Zhipu)Alibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index46.138.8
Released2026-02-112026-04-27
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window205K1M
Max output131K66K
Input $ / M tokens$1$0.19
Output $ / M tokens$3.20$1.13
Results tracked4513

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Category by category

Coding Not comparable

GLM-5: 49.0 (#52), Qwen3.6 Flash: —

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
ALE-Bench765.62326.4
SWE-bench Verified72.1%—
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)72.8%—
LMArena WebDev1434—
SWE-bench Multilingual69.7%—
WeirdML48.2%—
LMArena Coding1461—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

GLM-5: 31.1 (#71), Qwen3.6 Flash: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
Terminal-Bench52.4%—
τ²-bench Airline82.5%—
τ²-bench Banking9.8%—
τ²-bench Retail73.7%—
τ²-bench Telecom86.8%—
Vending-Bench 24,432—

Reasoning Qwen3.6 Flash leads

GLM-5: 27.6 (#116), Qwen3.6 Flash: 29.0 (#96)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
SimpleBench53.2%35.2%
Chess Puzzles10%20%
Epoch Capabilities Index145.83143.26
ARC-AGI-24.9%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark75%—
NYT Connections (extended)74.8%—
ARC-AGI-144.7%—
LMArena Hard Prompts1452—
Mystery Game Puzzles—18%
DTBench—77.1%
LMCA—31%
ForecastBench61—

Math GLM-5 leads

GLM-5: 46.4 (#71), Qwen3.6 Flash: 39.0 (#117)

Knowledge GLM-5 leads

GLM-5: 52.3 (#64), Qwen3.6 Flash: 42.1 (#100)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
GPQA Diamond87.8%83.3%
SimpleQA Verified—15.9%
Vectara Hallucination Rate10.1%—
LMArena Expert1454—

Multilingual Not comparable

GLM-5: 53.7 (#58), Qwen3.6 Flash: —

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
LMArena Non-English1430—
LMArena Chinese1511—
LMArena French1455—
LMArena German1445—
LMArena Japanese1416—
LMArena Korean1423—
LMArena Russian1436—
LMArena Spanish1454—

Instruction Following Not comparable

GLM-5: 75.2 (#67), Qwen3.6 Flash: —

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
LMArena Instruction Following1428—

Long Context Not comparable

GLM-5: 44.7 (#60), Qwen3.6 Flash: —

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
CL-bench18.7%—
LMArena Longer Query1446—

Writing & Preference Not comparable

GLM-5: 66.0 (#38), Qwen3.6 Flash: —

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGLM-5Qwen3.6 Flash
LMArena Text1446—
LMArena Creative Writing1439—
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1601—
LMArena Multi-Turn1456—

Frequently asked questions

Is GLM-5 better than Qwen3.6 Flash?

GLM-5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.1 to 38.8 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.6 Flash costs 3.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GLM-5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, GLM-5 or Qwen3.6 Flash?

Qwen3.6 Flash is cheaper. It lists at $0.19 per million input tokens and $1.13 per million output tokens; GLM-5 lists at $1 and $3.20.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.6 Flash does, with 1M tokens against 205K.

How many benchmarks do GLM-5 and Qwen3.6 Flash share?

8 benchmarks have published results for both models. GLM-5 has 45 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Flash has 13.

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