Noometry

Model comparison

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct vs Step 3

Step 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.5 to 38.1 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 16 shared benchmarks.

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct Alibaba (Qwen)

38.1

Rank #190 Confirmed

Step 3 StepFun

40.5

Rank #149 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 16 benchmarks with published results for both. Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct scores higher in 5 categories and Step 3 in 3 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in coding, where Step 3 leads 40.1 to 35.5.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is Kagi LLM Benchmark: 49.5% for Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct and 62.3% for Step 3.

Side by side

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
ProviderAlibaba (Qwen)StepFun
Noometry Index38.140.5
Released2025-04—
WeightsOpenOpen
Context window262K—
Max output66K—
Input $ / M tokens$1.50—
Output $ / M tokens$7.50—
Results tracked2517

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Category by category

Coding Step 3 leads

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 35.5 (#223), Step 3: 40.1 (#147)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Coding14121367
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)55.4%—
LMArena WebDev1275—
GSO4.9%—
WeirdML41.2%—
ALE-Bench461.45—
AlgoTune1.44—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 23.9 (#123), Step 3: —

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
Terminal-Bench27.2%—

Reasoning Step 3 leads

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 25.5 (#149), Step 3: 28.4 (#105)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
Kagi LLM Benchmark49.5%62.3%
LMArena Hard Prompts13721355

Math Too close to call

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 37.6 (#150), Step 3: 37.6 (#148)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Math13651366

Knowledge Too close to call

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 37.0 (#162), Step 3: 36.8 (#164)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Expert13381333

Multimodal Not comparable

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: —, Step 3: 35.5 (#86)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Vision—1177

Multilingual Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 47.7 (#148), Step 3: 46.3 (#159)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Non-English13461327
LMArena Chinese13571397
LMArena German13251371
LMArena Korean13051269
LMArena Russian13661331
LMArena Spanish13601371
LMArena French1398—
LMArena Japanese1310—

Instruction Following Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 71.6 (#147), Step 3: 70.4 (#164)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Instruction Following13551332

Long Context Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct leads

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 42.0 (#131), Step 3: 40.3 (#157)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Longer Query13781326

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

Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 55.3 (#147), Step 3: 54.3 (#151)

BenchmarkQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructStep 3
LMArena Text13571350
LMArena Creative Writing13331321
LMArena Multi-Turn13651341

Frequently asked questions

Is Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct better than Step 3?

Step 3 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.5 to 38.1 on the Noometry Index.

Is Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct or Step 3 better for coding?

Step 3 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 35.5 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct and Step 3 share?

16 benchmarks have published results for both models. Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct has 25 scored results on Noometry and Step 3 has 17.

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