# Gemma 3 27B vs Granite 4.2 8B

> Granite 4.2 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.0 to 30.5 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gemma-3-27b-vs-granite-4-2-8b
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 11

## Summary

- They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 3 27B scores higher in 3 categories and Granite 4.2 8B in 4 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in coding, where Granite 4.2 8B leads 39.9 to 22.1.
- Gemma 3 27B is cheaper at $0.08 / $0.16 per million input/output tokens, against $0.06 / $0.25 for Granite 4.2 8B.

## Snapshot

| | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Google | IBM |
| Noometry Index | 30.5 | 40.0 |
| Rank | 277 | 143 |
| Context | 131K | 131K |
| Input $/M | $0.08 | $0.06 |
| Output $/M | $0.16 | $0.25 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Gemma 3 27B: 22.1 (#329)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 39.9 (#138)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1322 | 1379 |
| Aider Polyglot | 4.9% | — |
| SciCode | 21.2% | — |
| LiveBench Coding | 39.9% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Gemma 3 27B: 24.9 (#105)
- Granite 4.2 8B: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 29.5% | — |

## Reasoning

- Gemma 3 27B: 16.3 (#297)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 25.5 (#130)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1340 | 1327 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 40.4% | — |
| CritPt | 0% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 43.8% | — |
| DTBench | 52.5% | — |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 51.5% | — |
| LMCA | 12.3% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 130.04 | — |
| LiveBench | 50% | — |

## Math

- Gemma 3 27B: 24.4 (#261)
- Granite 4.2 8B: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 22.5% | — |
| LiveBench Math | 55.4% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1312 | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 74% | — |

## Knowledge

- Gemma 3 27B: 25.4 (#256)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 37.7 (#144)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1303 | 1380 |
| GPQA Diamond | 47.7% | — |
| Confabulations | 40.3% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 7.4% | — |

## Multimodal

- Gemma 3 27B: 32.0 (#94)
- Granite 4.2 8B: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1165 | — |
| GeoBench | 52% | — |

## Multilingual

- Gemma 3 27B: 47.0 (#150)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#173)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1334 | 1299 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1347 | 1361 |
| LMArena Russian | 1349 | 1283 |
| LMArena French | 1368 | — |
| LMArena German | 1362 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1287 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1308 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1348 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Gemma 3 27B: 70.8 (#155)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#183)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1321 | 1298 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 74.9% | — |

## Long Context

- Gemma 3 27B: 27.6 (#288)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 40.2 (#154)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1333 | 1323 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | 33.3% | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Gemma 3 27B: 52.7 (#161)
- Granite 4.2 8B: 49.8 (#183)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Granite 4.2 8B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1358 | 1319 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1346 | 1238 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1344 | 1299 |
| Short-Story Creative Writing | 79.9% | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1266 | — |
| LiveBench Language | 34.6% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Gemma 3 27B better than Granite 4.2 8B?

Granite 4.2 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.0 to 30.5 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, Gemma 3 27B or Granite 4.2 8B?

Gemma 3 27B is cheaper. It lists at $0.08 per million input tokens and $0.16 per million output tokens; Granite 4.2 8B lists at $0.06 and $0.25.

### Is Gemma 3 27B or Granite 4.2 8B better for coding?

Granite 4.2 8B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.9 versus 22.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Both accept 131K tokens.

### How many benchmarks do Gemma 3 27B and Granite 4.2 8B share?

11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 3 27B has 43 scored results on Noometry and Granite 4.2 8B has 11.