# Gemini 3.8 Flash vs Qwen3.5-9B

> Gemini 3.8 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.8 to 33.8 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.5-9B costs 13× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.8 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gemini-3-8-flash-vs-qwen3-5-9b
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 8

## Summary

- They share 8 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemini 3.8 Flash scores higher in 5 categories and Qwen3.5-9B in 0 categories; 5 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Gemini 3.8 Flash leads 76.9 to 23.1.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is Chess Puzzles: 61% for Gemini 3.8 Flash and 12% for Qwen3.5-9B.
- Qwen3.5-9B is cheaper at $0.10 / $0.15 per million input/output tokens, against $0.75 / $3.75 for Gemini 3.8 Flash.
- Gemini 3.8 Flash accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 262K.
- Qwen3.5-9B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Google | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 61.8 | 33.8 |
| Rank | 11 | 236 |
| Context | 1.05M | 262K |
| Input $/M | $0.75 | $0.10 |
| Output $/M | $3.75 | $0.15 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |

## Coding

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 59.2 (#15)
- Qwen3.5-9B: 35.9 (#217)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | 56.6% | 27.5% |
| DeepSWE | 73.8% | — |
| FrontierCode | 41.2% | — |
| CursorBench | 39.6% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1584 | — |
| FrontierSWE | 19.6% | — |
| WeirdML | 84.8% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1510 | — |
| ALE-Bench | 1,270 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 41.8 (#21)
- Qwen3.5-9B: 14.5 (#151)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | — | 9.2% |
| APEX-Agents | 64.3% | — |
| Remote Labor Index | 5.8% | — |
| GDP.pdf | 23.4% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 5,094 | — |

## Reasoning

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 76.9 (#5)
- Qwen3.5-9B: 23.1 (#182)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | 18.3% | 0.3% |
| Chess Puzzles | 61% | 12% |
| DTBench | 95.7% | 71.2% |
| LMCA | 52.9% | 24.5% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 156.71 | 139.46 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 89.2% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 97.4% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 98.5% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1508 | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 47% | — |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 76.9% | — |

## Math

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 65.3 (#28)
- Qwen3.5-9B: 34.8 (#192)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 98.9% | 61.7% |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 68.4% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 22% | — |
| MathArena Final-Answer Competitions | — | 48.5% |
| ProofBench | 48% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1528 | — |

## Knowledge

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 74.8 (#2)
- Qwen3.5-9B: 46.0 (#84)

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 95.4% | 79% |
| Humanity's Last Exam | 44.5% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 69.7% | — |
| LMArena Expert | 1524 | — |

## Multimodal

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 40.7 (#45)
- Qwen3.5-9B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1314 | — |
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | 38.6% | — |
| Furniture Assembly | 31.7% | — |

## Multilingual

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 58.0 (#5)
- Qwen3.5-9B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1491 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1554 | — |
| LMArena French | 1498 | — |
| LMArena German | 1493 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1502 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1459 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1515 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1485 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 78.0 (#13)
- Qwen3.5-9B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1490 | — |

## Long Context

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 46.3 (#24)
- Qwen3.5-9B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1508 | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Gemini 3.8 Flash: 72.2 (#15)
- Qwen3.5-9B: —

| Benchmark | Gemini 3.8 Flash | Qwen3.5-9B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1499 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1492 | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1748 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1501 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Gemini 3.8 Flash better than Qwen3.5-9B?

Gemini 3.8 Flash is the stronger model overall, scoring 61.8 to 33.8 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.5-9B costs 13× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Gemini 3.8 Flash's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.8 Flash 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; Gemini 3.8 Flash lists at $0.75 and $3.75.

### Is Gemini 3.8 Flash or Qwen3.5-9B better for coding?

Gemini 3.8 Flash scores higher on coding benchmarks: 59.2 versus 35.9 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 3.8 Flash does, with 1.05M tokens against 262K.

### How many benchmarks do Gemini 3.8 Flash and Qwen3.5-9B share?

8 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemini 3.8 Flash has 50 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5-9B has 10.