# Granite 4.0 Micro vs Qwen Max

> Qwen Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 34.7 to 29.0 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.0 Micro costs 69× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/granite-4-0-micro-vs-qwen-max
- Last updated: 2026-10-11
- Shared benchmarks: 2

## Summary

- They share 2 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.0 Micro scores higher in 1 category and Qwen Max in 4 categories; 5 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen Max leads 30.3 to 9.9.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is GPQA Diamond: 28.3% for Granite 4.0 Micro and 56.1% for Qwen Max.
- Granite 4.0 Micro is cheaper at $0.017 / $0.11 per million input/output tokens, against $1.60 / $6.40 for Qwen Max.
- Granite 4.0 Micro accepts more context: 131K tokens versus 33K.
- Granite 4.0 Micro has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 29.0 | 34.7 |
| Rank | 318 | 230 |
| Context | 131K | 33K |
| Input $/M | $0.017 | $1.60 |
| Output $/M | $0.11 | $6.40 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Granite 4.0 Micro: —
- Qwen Max: 30.7 (#292)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| Aider Polyglot | — | 21.8% |
| LMArena Coding | — | 1288 |

## Reasoning

- Granite 4.0 Micro: 19.2 (#265)
- Qwen Max: 25.1 (#151)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | — | 1269 |

## Math

- Granite 4.0 Micro: 12.0 (#307)
- Qwen Max: 22.3 (#276)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 2.8% | 16.1% |
| Omni-MATH | 20.9% | — |
| LMArena Math | — | 1275 |
| MATH Level 5 | — | 67.2% |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 1% |

## Knowledge

- Granite 4.0 Micro: 9.9 (#304)
- Qwen Max: 30.3 (#228)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 28.3% | 56.1% |
| MMLU-Pro | 39.5% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 30.7% | — |
| LMArena Expert | — | 1248 |

## Multilingual

- Granite 4.0 Micro: —
- Qwen Max: 41.8 (#202)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | — | 1263 |
| LMArena Chinese | — | 1254 |
| LMArena French | — | 1330 |
| LMArena German | — | 1254 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1205 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1142 |
| LMArena Russian | — | 1274 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1290 |

## Instruction Following

- Granite 4.0 Micro: 69.9 (#169)
- Qwen Max: 66.5 (#208)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| IFEval | 84.9% | — |
| LMArena Instruction Following | — | 1262 |

## Long Context

- Granite 4.0 Micro: —
- Qwen Max: 39.4 (#180)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| Fiction.LiveBench | — | 66.7% |
| LMArena Longer Query | — | 1288 |

## Writing & Preference

- Granite 4.0 Micro: 46.7 (#216)
- Qwen Max: 47.8 (#205)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.0 Micro | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | — | 1282 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | — | 1248 |
| WildBench | 67% | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | — | 1277 |

## FAQ

### Is Granite 4.0 Micro better than Qwen Max?

Qwen Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 34.7 to 29.0 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.0 Micro costs 69× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Granite 4.0 Micro or Qwen Max?

Granite 4.0 Micro is cheaper. It lists at $0.017 per million input tokens and $0.11 per million output tokens; Qwen Max lists at $1.60 and $6.40.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Granite 4.0 Micro does, with 131K tokens against 33K.

### How many benchmarks do Granite 4.0 Micro and Qwen Max share?

2 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.0 Micro has 8 scored results on Noometry and Qwen Max has 23.