# Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct vs Qwen3 Max

> Qwen3 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.7 to 38.1 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/qwen3-coder-480b-a35b-instruct-vs-qwen3-max
- Last updated: 2026-10-12
- Shared benchmarks: 19

## Summary

- They share 19 benchmarks with published results for both. Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct scores higher in 2 categories and Qwen3 Max in 6 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3 Max leads 48.1 to 37.0.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is Kagi LLM Benchmark: 49.5% for Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct and 72.5% for Qwen3 Max.
- Qwen3 Max is cheaper at $1.20 / $6 per million input/output tokens, against $1.50 / $7.50 for Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct.
- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Alibaba (Qwen) | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 38.1 | 43.7 |
| Rank | 190 | 87 |
| Context | 262K | 262K |
| Input $/M | $1.50 | $1.20 |
| Output $/M | $7.50 | $6 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 35.5 (#223)
- Qwen3 Max: 43.0 (#93)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1412 | 1456 |
| ALE-Bench | 461.45 | 370.45 |
| SWE-bench Verified (bash only) | 55.4% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1275 | — |
| GSO | 4.9% | — |
| WeirdML | 41.2% | — |
| AlgoTune | 1.44 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 23.9 (#123)
- Qwen3 Max: —

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | 27.2% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 71.56 |

## Reasoning

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 25.5 (#149)
- Qwen3 Max: 22.6 (#190)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 49.5% | 72.5% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1372 | 1448 |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 30.1% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 4% |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 5% |
| DTBench | — | 82.1% |
| LMCA | — | 28.3% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 142.38 |

## Math

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 37.6 (#150)
- Qwen3 Max: 38.7 (#131)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1365 | 1446 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 18.9% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 73.3% |
| MATH Level 5 | — | 97.1% |

## Knowledge

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 37.0 (#162)
- Qwen3 Max: 48.1 (#78)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1338 | 1455 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 72.6% |
| SimpleQA Verified | — | 48.7% |

## Multilingual

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 47.7 (#148)
- Qwen3 Max: 53.7 (#62)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1346 | 1429 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1357 | 1478 |
| LMArena French | 1398 | 1449 |
| LMArena German | 1325 | 1463 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1310 | 1397 |
| LMArena Korean | 1305 | 1399 |
| LMArena Russian | 1366 | 1428 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1360 | 1462 |

## Instruction Following

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 71.6 (#147)
- Qwen3 Max: 74.8 (#87)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1355 | 1419 |

## Long Context

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 42.0 (#131)
- Qwen3 Max: 41.6 (#134)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1378 | 1438 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | — | 66.7% |
| CL-bench | — | 14.5% |

## Writing & Preference

- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: 55.3 (#147)
- Qwen3 Max: 62.4 (#76)

| Benchmark | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct | Qwen3 Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1357 | 1439 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1333 | 1402 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1365 | 1446 |

## FAQ

### Is Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct better than Qwen3 Max?

Qwen3 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.7 to 38.1 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct or Qwen3 Max?

Qwen3 Max is cheaper. It lists at $1.20 per million input tokens and $6 per million output tokens; Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct lists at $1.50 and $7.50.

### Is Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct or Qwen3 Max better for coding?

Qwen3 Max scores higher on coding benchmarks: 43.0 versus 35.5 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Both accept 262K tokens.

### How many benchmarks do Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct and Qwen3 Max share?

19 benchmarks have published results for both models. Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct has 25 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3 Max has 33.