Model comparison
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct vs Qwen3 Max
Qwen3 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.7 to 32.4 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 12 shared benchmarks.
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 3.1 8b Instruct scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3 Max in 8 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3 Max leads 62.4 to 35.5.
- Granite 3.1 8b Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 32.4 | 43.7 |
| Released | — | 2025-09-23 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | — | 262K |
| Max output | — | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | — | $1.20 |
| Output $ / M tokens | — | $6 |
| Results tracked | 13 | 33 |
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Category by category
Coding Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 34.5 (#233), Qwen3 Max: 43.0 (#93)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1186 | 1456 |
| ALE-Bench | — | 370.45 |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 24.1 (#120), Qwen3 Max: —
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 27.1% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 71.56 |
Reasoning Too close to call
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 22.1 (#207), Qwen3 Max: 22.6 (#190)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1145 | 1448 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 72.5% |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 30.1% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 4% |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 5% |
| DTBench | — | 82.1% |
| LMCA | — | 28.3% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 142.38 |
Math Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 33.0 (#209), Qwen3 Max: 38.7 (#131)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1152 | 1446 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 18.9% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 73.3% |
| MATH Level 5 | — | 97.1% |
Knowledge Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 31.1 (#220), Qwen3 Max: 48.1 (#78)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1142 | 1455 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 72.6% |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 48.7% |
Multilingual Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 30.9 (#260), Qwen3 Max: 53.7 (#62)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1099 | 1429 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1145 | 1478 |
| LMArena Russian | 1092 | 1428 |
| LMArena French | — | 1449 |
| LMArena German | — | 1463 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1397 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1399 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1462 |
Instruction Following Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 58.6 (#259), Qwen3 Max: 74.8 (#87)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1131 | 1419 |
Long Context Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 35.2 (#241), Qwen3 Max: 41.6 (#134)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1162 | 1438 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | — | 66.7% |
| CL-bench | — | 14.5% |
Writing & Preference Qwen3 Max leads
Granite 3.1 8b Instruct: 35.5 (#266), Qwen3 Max: 62.4 (#76)
| Benchmark | Granite 3.1 8b Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1150 | 1439 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1129 | 1402 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1108 | 1446 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Granite 3.1 8b Instruct better than Qwen3 Max?
Qwen3 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.7 to 32.4 on the Noometry Index.
Is Granite 3.1 8b Instruct or Qwen3 Max better for coding?
Qwen3 Max scores higher on coding benchmarks: 43.0 versus 34.5 in the Noometry coding category.
How many benchmarks do Granite 3.1 8b Instruct and Qwen3 Max share?
12 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 3.1 8b Instruct has 13 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3 Max has 33.