Model comparison

Llama 3.2 3B vs Qwen3.5-9B

Qwen3.5-9B is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.3 to 28.4 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 0 shared benchmarks.

Summary

The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3.5-9B leads 46.0 to 29.1.
Qwen3.5-9B is cheaper at $0.10 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.05 / $0.33 for Llama 3.2 3B.
Qwen3.5-9B accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 131K.

Side by side

Llama 3.2 3B and Qwen3.5-9B specifications
	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
Provider	Meta	Alibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index	28.4	33.3
Released	2024-09-24	2026-02-23
Weights	Open	Open
Context window	131K	262K
Max output	118K	66K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.05	$0.10
Output $ / M tokens	$0.33	$0.15
Results tracked	18	10

Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry

Category by category

Coding Qwen3.5-9B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 27.1 (#314), Qwen3.5-9B: 35.3 (#213)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
SciCode	—	27.5%
BigCodeBench Instruct	23.4%	—
LMArena Coding	1098	—
BigCodeBench Complete	28.3%	—

Agentic & Tool Use Llama 3.2 3B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 19.9 (#135), Qwen3.5-9B: 14.4 (#143)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
Terminal-Bench	—	9.2%
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard	21.9%	—
BALROG	10.1%	—

Reasoning Qwen3.5-9B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 20.1 (#225), Qwen3.5-9B: 22.5 (#178)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
CritPt	—	0.3%
Chess Puzzles	—	12%
LMArena Hard Prompts	1095	—
DTBench	—	71.2%
LMCA	—	24.5%
Epoch Capabilities Index	—	139.45

Math Qwen3.5-9B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 29.9 (#213), Qwen3.5-9B: 33.5 (#174)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
MathArena Final-Answer Competitions	—	48.5%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	—	61.7%
LMArena Math	1126	—

Knowledge Qwen3.5-9B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 29.1 (#232), Qwen3.5-9B: 46.0 (#77)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
GPQA Diamond	—	79%
LMArena Expert	1090	—

Multilingual Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 26.4 (#276), Qwen3.5-9B: —

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
LMArena Non-English	1019	—
LMArena Chinese	1017	—
LMArena German	1056	—
LMArena Russian	949	—

Instruction Following Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 56.3 (#270), Qwen3.5-9B: —

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
LMArena Instruction Following	1089	—

Long Context Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 33.4 (#256), Qwen3.5-9B: —

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
LMArena Longer Query	1101	—

Writing & Preference Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 24.9 (#302), Qwen3.5-9B: —

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Qwen3.5-9B
LMArena Text	1110	—
LMArena Creative Writing	1094	—
EQ-Bench Creative Writing	595	—
LMArena Multi-Turn	1105	—

Frequently asked questions

Is Llama 3.2 3B better than Qwen3.5-9B?

Qwen3.5-9B is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.3 to 28.4 on the Noometry Index.

Which is cheaper, Llama 3.2 3B or Qwen3.5-9B?

Qwen3.5-9B is cheaper. It lists at $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.15 per million output tokens; Llama 3.2 3B lists at $0.05 and $0.33.

Is Llama 3.2 3B or Qwen3.5-9B better for coding?

Qwen3.5-9B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 35.3 versus 27.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.5-9B does, with 262K tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Llama 3.2 3B and Qwen3.5-9B share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Llama 3.2 3B has 18 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5-9B has 10.