Gemini 3.6 Flash (High) vs Qwen3.8 27B (Low)
Which is better for the money: Gemini 3.6 Flash (High) by Google or Qwen3.8 27B (Low) 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
Gemini 3.6 Flash (High) scores 7.8 points higher (34.0 vs 26.2) but costs 1.5× as much to run the benchmark ($1614 vs $1060; both premium class). Pick Gemini 3.6 Flash (High) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Qwen3.8 27B (Low).
| Metric | Gemini 3.6 Flash (High) | Qwen3.8 27B (Low) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 34.0 | 26.2 | −22.9% Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is 22.9% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,614.42 | $1,060.08 | −34.3% Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is 34.3% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 20.26s | 55.56s | +174.2% Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is 174.2% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.75 / $3.75 | $0.50 / $3.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8 27B (Low) vs Gemini 3.6 Flash (High): 22.9% less intelligence, 34.3% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 174.2% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemini 3.6 Flash (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
- Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
Gemini 3.6 Flash (High)Qwen3.8 27B (Low)Today'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/gemini-3-6-flash/qwen3-8-27b-low · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gemini-3-6-flash/qwen3-8-27b-low?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill