DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24) vs Qwen3.8-Flash-Next
Which is better for the money: DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24) by DeepSeek or Qwen3.8-Flash-Next by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Qwen3.8-Flash-Next scores 31.3 points higher (39.8 vs 8.5) but costs 14× as much to run the benchmark ($363 vs $25.4; mid-range vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3.8-Flash-Next when you need intelligence above 8.5, and DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24) when 8.5 is enough.
| Metric | DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24) | Qwen3.8-Flash-Next | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 8.5 | 39.8 | +368.2% Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is 4.7× more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $25.37 | $362.72 | +1329.7% Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is 14× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 10.23s | 50.49s | +393.5% Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is 393.5% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.32 / $0.89 | $0.15 / $0.47 | |
| Input modalities | Text | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8-Flash-Next vs DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24): 368.2% more intelligence, 1329.7% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 393.5% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Low) scores 21.50 for $10.6.
- Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Medium) scores 47.80 for $361.
DeepSeek V3 (Dec '24)Qwen3.8-Flash-NextToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/deepseek-v3/qwen3-8-flash-next · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/deepseek-v3/qwen3-8-flash-next?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill