Model comparison
Granite 4.2 8B vs Qwen3.5-Flash
Qwen3.5-Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 42.3 to 40.0 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.2 8B costs 1.6× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.5-Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 11 shared benchmarks.
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 8B scores higher in 1 category and Qwen3.5-Flash in 6 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3.5-Flash leads 58.2 to 49.8.
- Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.25 per million input/output tokens, against $0.10 / $0.40 for Qwen3.5-Flash.
- Qwen3.5-Flash accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 131K.
- Granite 4.2 8B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 40.0 | 42.3 |
| Released | — | 2026-02-23 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | 131K | 1M |
| Max output | 118K | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.06 | $0.10 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.25 | $0.40 |
| Results tracked | 11 | 32 |
Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry
Category by category
Coding Granite 4.2 8B leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 39.9 (#138), Qwen3.5-Flash: 33.9 (#234)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1379 | 1412 |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1243 |
| ALE-Bench | — | 221.8 |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3.5-Flash: —
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 462.69 |
Reasoning Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 25.5 (#130), Qwen3.5-Flash: 32.9 (#63)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1327 | 1404 |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 21% |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 20% |
| DTBench | — | 82.9% |
| LMCA | — | 29.1% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 143.98 |
Math Not comparable
Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3.5-Flash: 36.3 (#117)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 18.2% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 84.4% |
| LMArena Math | — | 1407 |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 6.2% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | — | 0% |
Knowledge Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 37.7 (#144), Qwen3.5-Flash: 43.2 (#84)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1380 | 1408 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 82.3% |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 20.3% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 10.5% |
Multilingual Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#173), Qwen3.5-Flash: 50.7 (#116)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1299 | 1385 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1361 | 1446 |
| LMArena Russian | 1283 | 1379 |
| LMArena French | — | 1412 |
| LMArena German | — | 1389 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1369 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1344 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1399 |
Instruction Following Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#183), Qwen3.5-Flash: 72.8 (#133)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1298 | 1374 |
Long Context Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 40.2 (#154), Qwen3.5-Flash: 42.4 (#119)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1323 | 1392 |
Writing & Preference Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 49.8 (#183), Qwen3.5-Flash: 58.2 (#117)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1319 | 1397 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1238 | 1343 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1299 | 1393 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Granite 4.2 8B better than Qwen3.5-Flash?
Qwen3.5-Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 42.3 to 40.0 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.2 8B costs 1.6× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.5-Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3.5-Flash?
Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.25 per million output tokens; Qwen3.5-Flash lists at $0.10 and $0.40.
Is Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3.5-Flash better for coding?
Granite 4.2 8B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.9 versus 33.9 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3.5-Flash does, with 1M tokens against 131K.
How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3.5-Flash share?
11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 8B has 11 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5-Flash has 32.