Noometry

Model comparison

Qwen3.5 27B vs Step 3.5 Flash

Qwen3.5 27B and Step 3.5 Flash score almost the same on the Noometry Index (41.9 vs 42.3), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.

Last verified . 19 shared benchmarks.

Qwen3.5 27B Alibaba (Qwen)

41.9

Rank #127 Confirmed

Step 3.5 Flash StepFun

42.3

Rank #116 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 19 benchmarks with published results for both. Qwen3.5 27B scores higher in 5 categories and Step 3.5 Flash in 3 categories; 4 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Qwen3.5 27B leads 27.5 to 22.2.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is NYT Connections (extended): 47.9% for Qwen3.5 27B and 28.4% for Step 3.5 Flash.
  • Step 3.5 Flash is cheaper at $0.10 / $0.30 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $2.40 for Qwen3.5 27B.
  • Qwen3.5 27B accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 256K.

Side by side

Qwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
ProviderAlibaba (Qwen)StepFun
Noometry Index41.942.3
Released2026-02-232026-01-29
WeightsOpenOpen
Context window262K256K
Max output66K256K
Input $ / M tokens$0.30$0.10
Output $ / M tokens$2.40$0.30
Results tracked2819

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

Category by category

Coding Step 3.5 Flash leads

Qwen3.5 27B: 38.9 (#168), Step 3.5 Flash: 42.4 (#105)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Coding14271436
LMArena WebDev1358—
WeirdML39.5%—
ALE-Bench349.45—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Qwen3.5 27B: —, Step 3.5 Flash: —

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
Vending-Bench 2201.98—

Reasoning Qwen3.5 27B leads

Qwen3.5 27B: 27.5 (#117), Step 3.5 Flash: 22.2 (#202)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
NYT Connections (extended)47.9%28.4%
LMArena Hard Prompts14141411
Thematic Generalization45.5%—
DTBench82.4%—
LMCA34%—

Math Step 3.5 Flash leads

Qwen3.5 27B: 38.8 (#127), Step 3.5 Flash: 42.6 (#84)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
MathArena Final-Answer Competitions56.7%66.8%
LMArena Math14291408

Knowledge Step 3.5 Flash leads

Qwen3.5 27B: 38.0 (#150), Step 3.5 Flash: 39.6 (#132)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Expert14281421
Vectara Hallucination Rate12.1%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Qwen3.5 27B: 39.4 (#59), Step 3.5 Flash: —

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Vision1241—

Multilingual Too close to call

Qwen3.5 27B: 50.8 (#115), Step 3.5 Flash: 50.5 (#119)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Non-English13901385
LMArena Chinese14781447
LMArena French14101421
LMArena German13931405
LMArena Japanese13451354
LMArena Korean13581352
LMArena Russian13901385
LMArena Spanish14071419

Instruction Following Too close to call

Qwen3.5 27B: 73.5 (#119), Step 3.5 Flash: 73.1 (#124)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Instruction Following13931385

Long Context Too close to call

Qwen3.5 27B: 43.1 (#106), Step 3.5 Flash: 42.8 (#117)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Longer Query14131402

Writing & Preference Too close to call

Qwen3.5 27B: 59.3 (#111), Step 3.5 Flash: 58.8 (#113)

BenchmarkQwen3.5 27BStep 3.5 Flash
LMArena Text14091403
LMArena Creative Writing13621357
LMArena Multi-Turn14101405

Frequently asked questions

Is Qwen3.5 27B better than Step 3.5 Flash?

Qwen3.5 27B and Step 3.5 Flash score almost the same on the Noometry Index (41.9 vs 42.3), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.

Which is cheaper, Qwen3.5 27B or Step 3.5 Flash?

Step 3.5 Flash is cheaper. It lists at $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.30 per million output tokens; Qwen3.5 27B lists at $0.30 and $2.40.

Is Qwen3.5 27B or Step 3.5 Flash better for coding?

Step 3.5 Flash scores higher on coding benchmarks: 42.4 versus 38.9 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.5 27B does, with 262K tokens against 256K.

How many benchmarks do Qwen3.5 27B and Step 3.5 Flash share?

19 benchmarks have published results for both models. Qwen3.5 27B has 28 scored results on Noometry and Step 3.5 Flash has 19.

Related comparisons

Go deeper