# Command A vs Granite 4.2 8B

> Granite 4.2 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.5 to 36.5 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/command-a-vs-granite-4-2-8b
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 11

## Summary

- They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Command A scores higher in 3 categories and Granite 4.2 8B in 4 categories; 4 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in coding, where Granite 4.2 8B leads 40.5 to 27.2.
- Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.25 per million input/output tokens, against $2.50 / $10 for Command A.
- Command A accepts more context: 256K tokens versus 131K.

## Snapshot

| | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Cohere | IBM |
| Noometry Index | 36.5 | 40.5 |
| Rank | 215 | 148 |
| Context | 256K | 131K |
| Input $/M | $2.50 | $0.06 |
| Output $/M | $10 | $0.25 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Command A: 27.2 (#322)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 40.5 (#137)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1330 | 1380 |
| Aider Polyglot | 12% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Command A: 35.9 (#40)
- Granite 4.2 8B: —

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 57.1% | — |

## Reasoning

- Command A: 18.3 (#283)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 26.6 (#131)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1326 | 1329 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 28.8% | — |
| DTBench | 61.3% | — |
| LMCA | 10.3% | — |

## Math

- Command A: 36.2 (#171)
- Granite 4.2 8B: —

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1300 | — |

## Knowledge

- Command A: 37.1 (#159)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 38.4 (#145)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1295 | 1384 |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 9.3% | — |

## Multilingual

- Command A: 45.3 (#170)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#178)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1313 | 1302 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1327 | 1366 |
| LMArena Russian | 1314 | 1285 |
| LMArena French | 1351 | — |
| LMArena German | 1341 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1285 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1285 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1347 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Command A: 69.1 (#177)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#184)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1309 | 1301 |

## Long Context

- Command A: 40.6 (#151)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 40.3 (#159)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1334 | 1324 |

## Writing & Preference

- Command A: 47.6 (#208)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 49.6 (#189)

| Benchmark | Command A | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1331 | 1320 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1319 | 1236 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1339 | 1301 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1145 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Command A better than Granite 4.2 8B?

Granite 4.2 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.5 to 36.5 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, Command A or Granite 4.2 8B?

Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.25 per million output tokens; Command A lists at $2.50 and $10.

### Is Command A or Granite 4.2 8B better for coding?

Granite 4.2 8B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.5 versus 27.2 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Command A does, with 256K tokens against 131K.

### How many benchmarks do Command A and Granite 4.2 8B share?

11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Command A has 24 scored results on Noometry and Granite 4.2 8B has 11.