# Command R vs Qwen3.5 397B-A17B

> Qwen3.5 397B-A17B is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.0 to 31.4 on the Noometry Index. Command R costs 5.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.5 397B-A17B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/command-r-vs-qwen3-5-397b-a17b
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 19

## Summary

- They share 19 benchmarks with published results for both. Command R scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3.5 397B-A17B leads 62.3 to 38.2.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is DTBench: 46.4% for Command R and 87.5% for Qwen3.5 397B-A17B.
- Command R is cheaper at $0.15 / $0.60 per million input/output tokens, against $0.60 / $3.60 for Qwen3.5 397B-A17B.
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 128K.

## Snapshot

| | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Cohere | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 31.4 | 46.0 |
| Rank | 272 | 67 |
| Context | 128K | 262K |
| Input $/M | $0.15 | $0.60 |
| Output $/M | $0.60 | $3.60 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Command R: 29.3 (#306)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 42.0 (#114)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1169 | 1465 |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1400 |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 37.1% | — |
| LiveBench Coding | 17.9% | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 45.2% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Command R: —
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 33.3 (#53)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| APEX-Agents | — | 24.9% |
| τ²-bench Airline | — | 81.5% |
| τ²-bench Banking | — | 9.8% |
| τ²-bench Retail | — | 84.4% |
| τ²-bench Telecom | — | 97.8% |

## Reasoning

- Command R: 13.8 (#331)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 34.5 (#70)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1164 | 1448 |
| DTBench | 46.4% | 87.5% |
| LMCA | 9.2% | 37.9% |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 73.7% |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 58.9% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 13% |
| Thematic Generalization | — | 65.1% |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 21.9% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 18% |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 33.3% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 146.65 |
| LiveBench | 27.5% | — |

## Math

- Command R: 28.0 (#246)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 46.1 (#73)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1155 | 1454 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 31.2% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 88.9% |
| LiveBench Math | 19.4% | — |

## Knowledge

- Command R: 31.0 (#221)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 53.3 (#58)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1138 | 1462 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 86.4% |
| MMLU | 65.2% | — |

## Multimodal

- Command R: —
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 40.7 (#44)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | — | 1263 |

## Multilingual

- Command R: 35.7 (#245)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 53.7 (#59)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1174 | 1430 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1182 | 1500 |
| LMArena French | 1162 | 1461 |
| LMArena German | 1176 | 1447 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1143 | 1426 |
| LMArena Korean | 1163 | 1384 |
| LMArena Russian | 1174 | 1429 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1151 | 1441 |

## Instruction Following

- Command R: 58.1 (#261)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 75.0 (#77)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1167 | 1424 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 55.6% | — |

## Long Context

- Command R: 36.3 (#231)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 44.1 (#74)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1198 | 1442 |

## Writing & Preference

- Command R: 38.2 (#254)
- Qwen3.5 397B-A17B: 62.3 (#79)

| Benchmark | Command R | Qwen3.5 397B-A17B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1187 | 1438 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1170 | 1401 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1163 | 1446 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | — | 1478 |
| LiveBench Language | 16.7% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Command R better than Qwen3.5 397B-A17B?

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.0 to 31.4 on the Noometry Index. Command R costs 5.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.5 397B-A17B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Command R or Qwen3.5 397B-A17B?

Command R is cheaper. It lists at $0.15 per million input tokens and $0.60 per million output tokens; Qwen3.5 397B-A17B lists at $0.60 and $3.60.

### Is Command R or Qwen3.5 397B-A17B better for coding?

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 42.0 versus 29.3 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.5 397B-A17B does, with 262K tokens against 128K.

### How many benchmarks do Command R and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B share?

19 benchmarks have published results for both models. Command R has 29 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5 397B-A17B has 36.