# Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct vs Qwen3.5 35B-A3B

> Qwen3.5 35B-A3B is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.7 to 28.8 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/phi-3-small-8k-instruct-vs-qwen3-5-35b-a3b
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 17

## Summary

- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.5 35B-A3B in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3.5 35B-A3B leads 58.1 to 31.3.

## Snapshot

| | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Microsoft | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 28.8 | 41.7 |
| Rank | 310 | 118 |
| Context | — | 262K |
| Input $/M | — | $0.25 |
| Output $/M | — | $2 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 27.4 (#313)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 33.5 (#244)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1102 | 1410 |
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1254 |
| SciCode | — | 29.3% |
| LiveBench Coding | 20.3% | — |

## Reasoning

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 14.2 (#319)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 23.9 (#158)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1100 | 1400 |
| CritPt | — | 0.6% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 10% |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 15.9% | — |
| DTBench | — | 80% |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 30.3% | — |
| LMCA | — | 29.5% |
| Adversarial NLI | 58.1% | — |
| BIG-Bench Hard | 79.1% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 142.52 |
| HellaSwag | 77% | — |
| LiveBench | 24% | — |
| WinoGrande | 81.5% | — |

## Math

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 25.4 (#247)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 38.4 (#86)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1151 | 1404 |
| MathArena Final-Answer Competitions | — | 56% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 70% |
| LiveBench Math | 17.6% | — |

## Knowledge

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 28.5 (#237)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 47.7 (#73)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1067 | 1408 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 83.5% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 10.5% |
| ARC (AI2) Challenge | 90.7% | — |
| MMLU | 75.7% | — |
| OpenBookQA | 88% | — |
| TriviaQA | 58.1% | — |

## Multilingual

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 28.6 (#267)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 50.2 (#122)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1058 | 1379 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1061 | 1458 |
| LMArena French | 1134 | 1412 |
| LMArena German | 1080 | 1367 |
| LMArena Japanese | 966 | 1326 |
| LMArena Korean | 894 | 1354 |
| LMArena Russian | 1111 | 1377 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1111 | 1390 |

## Instruction Following

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 52.2 (#287)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 73.0 (#123)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1087 | 1379 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 47.2% | — |

## Long Context

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 33.0 (#262)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 42.4 (#122)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1088 | 1390 |

## Writing & Preference

- Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct: 31.3 (#279)
- Qwen3.5 35B-A3B: 58.1 (#118)

| Benchmark | Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct | Qwen3.5 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1110 | 1395 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1083 | 1347 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1068 | 1391 |
| LiveBench Language | 12.9% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct better than Qwen3.5 35B-A3B?

Qwen3.5 35B-A3B is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.7 to 28.8 on the Noometry Index.

### Is Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct or Qwen3.5 35B-A3B better for coding?

Qwen3.5 35B-A3B scores higher on coding benchmarks: 33.5 versus 27.4 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct and Qwen3.5 35B-A3B share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Phi 3 Small 8k Instruct has 32 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5 35B-A3B has 28.