Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) vs Qwen3.8-Flash-Next
Which is better for the money: Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) by Google or Qwen3.8-Flash-Next by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-24.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Qwen3.8-Flash-Next scores 30.9 points higher (39.8 vs 8.9) but costs 25× as much to run the benchmark ($363 vs $14.7; mid-range vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3.8-Flash-Next when you need intelligence above 8.9, and Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) when 8.9 is enough.
| Metric | Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) | Qwen3.8-Flash-Next | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 8.9 | 39.8 | +347.2% Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is 4.5× more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $14.68 | $362.72 | +2370.8% Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is 25× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 57.75s | 50.57s | −12.4% Qwen3.8-Flash-Next is 12.4% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.02 / $0.10 | $0.15 / $0.47 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8-Flash-Next vs Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning): 347.2% more intelligence, 2370.8% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 12.4% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) 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.
Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning)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/gemma-4-e4b/qwen3-8-flash-next · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gemma-4-e4b/qwen3-8-flash-next?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill