Model comparison
Granite 4.2 8B vs Qwen3.6 Plus
Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.3 to 40.0 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.2 8B costs 10× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.6 Plus'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 0 categories and Qwen3.6 Plus in 7 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3.6 Plus leads 56.1 to 37.7.
- Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.25 per million input/output tokens, against $0.50 / $3 for Qwen3.6 Plus.
- Qwen3.6 Plus 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 | Qwen3.6 Plus | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 40.0 | 47.3 |
| Released | — | 2026-03-31 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | 131K | 1M |
| Max output | 118K | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.06 | $0.50 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.25 | $3 |
| Results tracked | 11 | 37 |
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Category by category
Coding Too close to call
Granite 4.2 8B: 39.9 (#138), Qwen3.6 Plus: 40.6 (#125)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1379 | 1467 |
| SWE-bench Verified | — | 57.9% |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1461 |
| SciCode | — | 40.7% |
| ALE-Bench | — | 670.15 |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3.6 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 5,115 |
Reasoning Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 25.5 (#130), Qwen3.6 Plus: 28.5 (#89)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1327 | 1449 |
| 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 Not comparable
Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3.6 Plus: 50.6 (#44)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 38.2% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 93.3% |
| LMArena Math | — | 1450 |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 26.2% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | — | 8.3% |
Knowledge Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 37.7 (#144), Qwen3.6 Plus: 56.1 (#40)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1380 | 1456 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 88.4% |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 44.1% |
Multilingual Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#173), Qwen3.6 Plus: 53.5 (#66)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1299 | 1424 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1361 | 1478 |
| LMArena Russian | 1283 | 1434 |
| LMArena French | — | 1454 |
| LMArena German | — | 1451 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1389 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1381 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1432 |
Instruction Following Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#183), Qwen3.6 Plus: 75.2 (#70)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1298 | 1425 |
Long Context Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 40.2 (#154), Qwen3.6 Plus: 45.1 (#48)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1323 | 1440 |
| CL-bench | — | 20.3% |
Writing & Preference Qwen3.6 Plus leads
Granite 4.2 8B: 49.8 (#183), Qwen3.6 Plus: 62.4 (#78)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1319 | 1437 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1238 | 1405 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1299 | 1438 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Granite 4.2 8B better than Qwen3.6 Plus?
Qwen3.6 Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.3 to 40.0 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.2 8B costs 10× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.6 Plus's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3.6 Plus?
Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.25 per million output tokens; Qwen3.6 Plus lists at $0.50 and $3.
Is Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3.6 Plus better for coding?
They score almost the same on coding (39.9 vs 40.6); test both on your own repository before choosing.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3.6 Plus does, with 1M tokens against 131K.
How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3.6 Plus share?
11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 8B has 11 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Plus has 37.