Model comparison

Granite 4.2 8B vs Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct

Granite 4.2 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.0 to 37.7 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 11 shared benchmarks.

Granite 4.2 8B IBM

40.0

Rank #143 Confirmed

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct

Alibaba (Qwen)

37.7

Rank #186 Confirmed

Summary

They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 8B scores higher in 3 categories and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct in 4 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads 55.5 to 49.8.
Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.25 per million input/output tokens, against $1.50 / $7.50 for Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct.
Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 131K.

Side by side

Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct specifications
	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
Provider	IBM	Alibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index	40.0	37.7
Released	—	2025-04
Weights	Open	Open
Context window	131K	262K
Max output	118K	66K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.06	$1.50
Output $ / M tokens	$0.25	$7.50
Results tracked	11	25

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Category by category

Coding Granite 4.2 8B leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 39.9 (#138), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 36.2 (#199)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Coding	1379	1413
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)	—	55.4%
LMArena WebDev	—	1275
GSO	—	4.9%
WeirdML	—	41.2%
ALE-Bench	—	461.45
AlgoTune	—	1.44

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 23.7 (#116)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
Terminal-Bench	—	27.2%

Reasoning Too close to call

Granite 4.2 8B: 25.5 (#130), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 24.7 (#141)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Hard Prompts	1327	1372
Kagi LLM Benchmark	—	49.5%

Math Not comparable

Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 34.9 (#151)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Math	—	1364

Knowledge Granite 4.2 8B leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 37.7 (#144), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 36.4 (#159)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Expert	1380	1337

Multilingual Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#173), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 47.8 (#143)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Non-English	1299	1345
LMArena Chinese	1361	1356
LMArena Russian	1283	1367
LMArena French	—	1394
LMArena German	—	1324
LMArena Japanese	—	1309
LMArena Korean	—	1307
LMArena Spanish	—	1360

Instruction Following Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#183), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 71.8 (#142)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Instruction Following	1298	1356

Long Context Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 40.2 (#154), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 42.0 (#126)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Longer Query	1323	1379

Writing & Preference Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 49.8 (#183), Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 55.5 (#142)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
LMArena Text	1319	1356
LMArena Creative Writing	1238	1333
LMArena Multi-Turn	1299	1365

Frequently asked questions

Is Granite 4.2 8B better than Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct?

Granite 4.2 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.0 to 37.7 on the Noometry Index.

Which is cheaper, Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct?

Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.25 per million output tokens; Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct lists at $1.50 and $7.50.

Is Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct better for coding?

Granite 4.2 8B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.9 versus 36.2 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct does, with 262K tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct share?

11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 8B has 11 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct has 25.