GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning) vs Qwen3.8 27B (Low)
Which is better for the money: GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning) by OpenAI or Qwen3.8 27B (Low) by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-27.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Qwen3.8 27B (Low) scores 5.4 points higher (26.2 vs 20.8) but costs 4.6× as much to run the benchmark ($1165 vs $256; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3.8 27B (Low) when you need intelligence above 20.8, and GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning) when 20.8 is enough.
| Metric | GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning) | Qwen3.8 27B (Low) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 20.8 | 26.2 | +26.0% Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is 26.0% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $255.77 | $1,164.93 | +355.5% Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is 4.6× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 4.90s | 55.03s | +1023.1% Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is 1023.1% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $12.0 | $0.50 / $3.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8 27B (Low) vs GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning): 26.0% more intelligence, 355.5% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 1023.1% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
- Qwen3.8 27B (Low) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
GPT-5.6 Terra (Non-reasoning)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/gpt-5-6-terra-non-reasoning/qwen3-8-27b-low · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gpt-5-6-terra-non-reasoning/qwen3-8-27b-low?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill