# Gemma 3 27B vs Qwen3.8 Max

> Qwen3.8 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 56.0 to 30.5 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 27B costs 30× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.8 Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gemma-3-27b-vs-qwen3-8-max
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 26

## Summary

- They share 26 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 3 27B scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.8 Max in 10 categories; 10 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Qwen3.8 Max leads 73.1 to 24.4.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 22.5% for Gemma 3 27B and 100% for Qwen3.8 Max.
- Gemma 3 27B is cheaper at $0.08 / $0.16 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $6 for Qwen3.8 Max.
- Qwen3.8 Max accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 131K.
- Gemma 3 27B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Google | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 30.5 | 56.0 |
| Rank | 277 | 21 |
| Context | 131K | 1M |
| Input $/M | $0.08 | $2 |
| Output $/M | $0.16 | $6 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Gemma 3 27B: 22.1 (#329)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 52.3 (#30)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | 21.2% | 52.9% |
| LMArena Coding | 1322 | 1499 |
| DeepSWE | — | 57.5% |
| Aider Polyglot | 4.9% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1671 |
| FrontierSWE | — | 15.8% |
| LiveBench Coding | 39.9% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Gemma 3 27B: 24.9 (#105)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 42.6 (#17)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 29.5% | — |
| τ²-bench Banking | — | 55.1% |
| GDP.pdf | — | 23.2% |

## Reasoning

- Gemma 3 27B: 16.3 (#297)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 53.4 (#26)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | 0% | 20% |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | 40% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1340 | 1493 |
| DTBench | 52.5% | 92% |
| LMCA | 12.3% | 46.2% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 130.04 | 156.69 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 40.4% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 88.3% |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 43.8% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 38% |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 51.5% | — |
| LiveBench | 50% | — |

## Math

- Gemma 3 27B: 24.4 (#261)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 73.1 (#15)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 22.5% | 100% |
| LMArena Math | 1312 | 1498 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 74.7% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | — | 46.3% |
| ProofBench | — | 58% |
| LiveBench Math | 55.4% | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 74% | — |

## Knowledge

- Gemma 3 27B: 25.4 (#256)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 61.7 (#25)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 47.7% | 92.7% |
| LMArena Expert | 1303 | 1504 |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 47.3% |
| Confabulations | 40.3% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 7.4% | — |

## Multimodal

- Gemma 3 27B: 32.0 (#94)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 36.9 (#70)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1165 | 1314 |
| GeoBench | 52% | — |
| Furniture Assembly | — | 20% |

## Multilingual

- Gemma 3 27B: 47.0 (#150)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 56.6 (#18)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1334 | 1468 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1347 | 1537 |
| LMArena French | 1368 | 1502 |
| LMArena German | 1362 | 1489 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1287 | 1466 |
| LMArena Korean | 1308 | 1467 |
| LMArena Russian | 1349 | 1478 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1348 | 1495 |

## Instruction Following

- Gemma 3 27B: 70.8 (#155)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 77.7 (#19)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1321 | 1478 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 74.9% | — |

## Long Context

- Gemma 3 27B: 27.6 (#288)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 45.5 (#30)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1333 | 1486 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | 33.3% | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Gemma 3 27B: 52.7 (#161)
- Qwen3.8 Max: 67.0 (#31)

| Benchmark | Gemma 3 27B | Qwen3.8 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1358 | 1480 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1346 | 1478 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1344 | 1487 |
| Short-Story Creative Writing | 79.9% | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1266 | — |
| LiveBench Language | 34.6% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Gemma 3 27B better than Qwen3.8 Max?

Qwen3.8 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 56.0 to 30.5 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 3 27B costs 30× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.8 Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Gemma 3 27B or Qwen3.8 Max?

Gemma 3 27B is cheaper. It lists at $0.08 per million input tokens and $0.16 per million output tokens; Qwen3.8 Max lists at $2 and $6.

### Is Gemma 3 27B or Qwen3.8 Max better for coding?

Qwen3.8 Max scores higher on coding benchmarks: 52.3 versus 22.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.8 Max does, with 1M tokens against 131K.

### How many benchmarks do Gemma 3 27B and Qwen3.8 Max share?

26 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 3 27B has 43 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.8 Max has 38.