# Granite 4.2 3b vs Nova Premier 1.0

> Granite 4.2 3b is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.4 to 38.3 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/granite-4-2-3b-vs-nova-premier-1-0
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 0

## Summary

- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Nova Premier 1.0 leads 51.0 to 47.2.
- Granite 4.2 3b has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Amazon |
| Noometry Index | 39.4 | 38.3 |
| Rank | 169 | 189 |
| Context | — | 1M |
| Input $/M | — | $2.50 |
| Output $/M | — | $12.50 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Granite 4.2 3b: 40.0 (#151)
- Nova Premier 1.0: —

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1361 | — |

## Reasoning

- Granite 4.2 3b: 26.0 (#138)
- Nova Premier 1.0: 23.0 (#185)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 44.8% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1306 | — |

## Math

- Granite 4.2 3b: —
- Nova Premier 1.0: 33.8 (#199)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| Omni-MATH | — | 35% |

## Knowledge

- Granite 4.2 3b: 36.3 (#171)
- Nova Premier 1.0: 35.8 (#180)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| MMLU-Pro | — | 72.6% |
| GPQA (HELM) | — | 51.8% |
| LMArena Expert | 1315 | — |

## Multilingual

- Granite 4.2 3b: 42.1 (#198)
- Nova Premier 1.0: —

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1268 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1269 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1249 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Granite 4.2 3b: 67.1 (#200)
- Nova Premier 1.0: 66.8 (#204)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| IFEval | — | 80.3% |
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1273 | — |

## Long Context

- Granite 4.2 3b: 39.2 (#185)
- Nova Premier 1.0: —

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1291 | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Granite 4.2 3b: 47.2 (#212)
- Nova Premier 1.0: 51.0 (#178)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova Premier 1.0 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1293 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1205 | — |
| WildBench | — | 78.8% |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1290 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Granite 4.2 3b better than Nova Premier 1.0?

Granite 4.2 3b is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.4 to 38.3 on the Noometry Index.

### How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 3b and Nova Premier 1.0 share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 3b has 11 scored results on Noometry and Nova Premier 1.0 has 6.