Noometry

Model comparison

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct vs Qwen3.6 Plus

Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.3 to 31.8 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 12 shared benchmarks.

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct IBM

31.8

Rank #256 Confirmed

Qwen3.6 Plus Alibaba (Qwen)

47.3

Rank #54 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 3.1 8b Instruct scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.6 Plus in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3.6 Plus leads 62.4 to 35.7.
  • Granite 3.1 8b Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Granite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
ProviderIBMAlibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index31.847.3
Released—2026-03-31
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window—1M
Max output—66K
Input $ / M tokens—$0.50
Output $ / M tokens—$3
Results tracked1337

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Category by category

Coding Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 33.9 (#232), Qwen3.6 Plus: 40.6 (#125)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Coding11861467
SWE-bench Verified—57.9%
LMArena WebDev—1461
SciCode—40.7%
ALE-Bench—670.15

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 23.9 (#113), Qwen3.6 Plus: —

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard27.1%—
Vending-Bench 2—5,115

Reasoning Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 21.2 (#204), Qwen3.6 Plus: 28.5 (#89)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Hard Prompts11461449
NYT Connections (extended)—60.3%
CritPt—2.9%
Chess Puzzles—17%
Thematic Generalization—59.5%
Mystery Game Puzzles—12%
DTBench—81.9%
LMCA—33.1%
Epoch Capabilities Index—147.67

Math Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 30.4 (#210), Qwen3.6 Plus: 50.6 (#44)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Math11521450
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)—38.2%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025—93.3%
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)—26.2%
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)—8.3%

Knowledge Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 30.6 (#218), Qwen3.6 Plus: 56.1 (#40)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Expert11421456
GPQA Diamond—88.4%
SimpleQA Verified—44.1%

Multilingual Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 31.1 (#255), Qwen3.6 Plus: 53.5 (#66)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Non-English10991424
LMArena Chinese11451478
LMArena Russian10921434
LMArena French—1454
LMArena German—1451
LMArena Japanese—1389
LMArena Korean—1381
LMArena Spanish—1432

Instruction Following Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 58.9 (#254), Qwen3.6 Plus: 75.2 (#70)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Instruction Following11311425

Long Context Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 35.2 (#236), Qwen3.6 Plus: 45.1 (#48)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Longer Query11621440
CL-bench—20.3%

Writing & Preference Qwen3.6 Plus leads

Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 35.7 (#261), Qwen3.6 Plus: 62.4 (#78)

BenchmarkGranite 3.1 8b InstructQwen3.6 Plus
LMArena Text11501437
LMArena Creative Writing11291405
LMArena Multi-Turn11081438

Frequently asked questions

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

Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.3 to 31.8 on the Noometry Index.

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

Qwen3.6 Plus scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.6 versus 33.9 in the Noometry coding category.

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

12 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 3.1 8b Instruct has 13 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Plus has 37.

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