# Granite 3.0 2b Instruct vs Qwen Plus

> Qwen Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.1 to 30.8 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/granite-3-0-2b-instruct-vs-qwen-plus
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 12

## Summary

- They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 3.0 2b Instruct scores higher in 2 categories and Qwen Plus in 6 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen Plus leads 52.2 to 29.6.
- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 30.8 | 37.1 |
| Rank | 286 | 210 |
| Context | — | 1M |
| Input $/M | — | $0.40 |
| Output $/M | — | $1.20 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 28.3 (#316)
- Qwen Plus: 38.9 (#167)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1090 | 1328 |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 20.5% | — |

## Reasoning

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 20.5 (#235)
- Qwen Plus: 28.4 (#107)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1073 | 1317 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 63.3% |
| DTBench | — | 81.1% |
| LMCA | — | 24% |

## Math

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 32.2 (#217)
- Qwen Plus: 23.3 (#271)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1117 | 1326 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 17.8% |
| MATH Level 5 | — | 65.3% |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 1.7% |

## Knowledge

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 29.0 (#241)
- Qwen Plus: 27.4 (#251)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1064 | 1328 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 48.1% |

## Multilingual

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 27.0 (#278)
- Qwen Plus: 45.1 (#175)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1033 | 1310 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1070 | 1347 |
| LMArena Russian | 1045 | 1323 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1251 |

## Instruction Following

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 53.9 (#284)
- Qwen Plus: 68.8 (#181)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1056 | 1303 |

## Long Context

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 32.5 (#268)
- Qwen Plus: 40.3 (#158)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1070 | 1324 |

## Writing & Preference

- Granite 3.0 2b Instruct: 29.6 (#292)
- Qwen Plus: 52.2 (#176)

| Benchmark | Granite 3.0 2b Instruct | Qwen Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1080 | 1326 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1046 | 1293 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1053 | 1336 |

## FAQ

### Is Granite 3.0 2b Instruct better than Qwen Plus?

Qwen Plus is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.1 to 30.8 on the Noometry Index.

### Is Granite 3.0 2b Instruct or Qwen Plus better for coding?

Qwen Plus scores higher on coding benchmarks: 38.9 versus 28.3 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do Granite 3.0 2b Instruct and Qwen Plus share?

12 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 3.0 2b Instruct has 13 scored results on Noometry and Qwen Plus has 20.