Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite vs Qwen3.8 Max
Which is better for the money: Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite by Google or Qwen3.8 Max by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-26.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Qwen3.8 Max scores 18.0 points higher (40.2 vs 22.2) but costs 8.7× as much to run the benchmark ($3172 vs $366; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3.8 Max when you need intelligence above 22.2, and Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite when 22.2 is enough.
| Metric | Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite | Qwen3.8 Max | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 22.2 | 40.2 | +81.1% Qwen3.8 Max is 81.1% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $365.63 | $3,172.37 | +767.6% Qwen3.8 Max is 8.7× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 9.09s | 64.42s | +608.7% Qwen3.8 Max is 608.7% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.30 / $2.50 | $2.00 / $6.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8 Max vs Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite: 81.1% more intelligence, 767.6% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 608.7% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Medium) scores 47.80 for $361.
- Qwen3.8 Max is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Kimi K3.1 Pro scores 55.10 for $3117.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-LiteQwen3.8 MaxToday's Pareto frontierEvery other model
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/gemini-3-5-flash-lite/qwen3-8-max-0803 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gemini-3-5-flash-lite/qwen3-8-max-0803?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill