# MiniMax M1 vs Qwen3.6 Flash

> MiniMax M1 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.3 to 38.8 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.6 Flash costs 2.3× less per token, which makes it the better buy when MiniMax M1's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/minimax-m1-vs-qwen3-6-flash
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 0

## Summary

- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3.6 Flash leads 42.1 to 36.4.
- Qwen3.6 Flash is cheaper at $0.19 / $1.13 per million input/output tokens, against $0.55 / $2.20 for MiniMax M1.
- MiniMax M1 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | MiniMax | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 40.3 | 38.8 |
| Rank | 150 | 182 |
| Context | 1M | 1M |
| Input $/M | $0.55 | $0.19 |
| Output $/M | $2.20 | $1.13 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- MiniMax M1: 39.9 (#153)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1359 | — |
| ALE-Bench | — | 326.4 |

## Reasoning

- MiniMax M1: 26.9 (#126)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: 29.0 (#96)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| SimpleBench | — | 35.2% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 20% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1339 | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 18% |
| DTBench | — | 77.1% |
| LMCA | — | 31% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 143.26 |

## Math

- MiniMax M1: 37.5 (#151)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: 39.0 (#117)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 22.5% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 84.4% |
| LMArena Math | 1361 | — |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 10.3% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | — | 0% |

## Knowledge

- MiniMax M1: 36.4 (#170)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: 42.1 (#100)

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | — | 83.3% |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 15.9% |
| LMArena Expert | 1317 | — |

## Multilingual

- MiniMax M1: 45.8 (#163)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1319 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1360 | — |
| LMArena French | 1370 | — |
| LMArena German | 1350 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1217 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1266 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1329 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1353 | — |

## Instruction Following

- MiniMax M1: 69.3 (#174)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1312 | — |

## Long Context

- MiniMax M1: 41.4 (#141)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| Fiction.LiveBench | 69.4% | — |
| LMArena Longer Query | 1326 | — |

## Writing & Preference

- MiniMax M1: 53.1 (#161)
- Qwen3.6 Flash: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax M1 | Qwen3.6 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1343 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1298 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1335 | — |

## FAQ

### Is MiniMax M1 better than Qwen3.6 Flash?

MiniMax M1 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.3 to 38.8 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.6 Flash costs 2.3× less per token, which makes it the better buy when MiniMax M1's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, MiniMax M1 or Qwen3.6 Flash?

Qwen3.6 Flash is cheaper. It lists at $0.19 per million input tokens and $1.13 per million output tokens; MiniMax M1 lists at $0.55 and $2.20.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Both accept 1M tokens.

### How many benchmarks do MiniMax M1 and Qwen3.6 Flash share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. MiniMax M1 has 18 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 Flash has 13.