Noometry

Model comparison

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct vs Qwen3.6 Max Preview

Qwen3.6 Max Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 51.5 to 32.4 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 12 shared benchmarks.

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct IBM

32.4

Rank #258 Confirmed

Qwen3.6 Max Preview Alibaba (Qwen)

51.5

Rank #43 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 3.1 8b Instruct scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.6 Max Preview in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads 63.8 to 35.5.
  • Granite 3.1 8b Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Granite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
ProviderIBMAlibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index32.451.5
Released—2026-04-20
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window—262K
Max output—66K
Input $ / M tokens—$1.30
Output $ / M tokens—$7.80
Results tracked1329

Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry

Category by category

Coding Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 34.5 (#233), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 48.7 (#54)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Coding11861471
SWE-bench Verified—76.7%
LMArena WebDev—1482

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 24.1 (#120), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: —

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard27.1%—
Vending-Bench 2—4,254

Reasoning Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 22.1 (#207), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 41.7 (#53)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Hard Prompts11451457
SimpleBench—63%
NYT Connections (extended)—74.1%
Chess Puzzles—20%
Mystery Game Puzzles—19%
DTBench—87.2%
LMCA—42.5%
Epoch Capabilities Index—149.24

Math Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 33.0 (#209), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 54.1 (#46)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Math11521465
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025—91.1%
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)—23.1%
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)—4.2%

Knowledge Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 31.1 (#220), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 57.6 (#39)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Expert11421478
GPQA Diamond—87.4%
SimpleQA Verified—52%

Multilingual Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 30.9 (#260), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 54.2 (#48)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Non-English10991437
LMArena Chinese11451487
LMArena Russian10921445
LMArena French—1449
LMArena Spanish—1454

Instruction Following Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 58.6 (#259), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 75.7 (#55)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Instruction Following11311438

Long Context Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 35.2 (#241), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 44.6 (#61)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Longer Query11621457

Writing & Preference Qwen3.6 Max Preview leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 35.5 (#266), Qwen3.6 Max Preview: 63.8 (#60)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Max Preview
LMArena Text11501447
LMArena Creative Writing11291435
LMArena Multi-Turn11081456

Frequently asked questions

Is Granite 3.1 8b Instruct better than Qwen3.6 Max Preview?

Qwen3.6 Max Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 51.5 to 32.4 on the Noometry Index.

Is Granite 3.1 8b Instruct or Qwen3.6 Max Preview better for coding?

Qwen3.6 Max Preview scores higher on coding benchmarks: 48.7 versus 34.5 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do Granite 3.1 8b Instruct and Qwen3.6 Max Preview share?

12 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 3.1 8b Instruct has 13 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Max Preview has 29.

Related comparisons

Go deeper