Granite 4.2 8B vs Grok 4.6 (Medium)
Which is better for the money: Granite 4.2 8B by IBM or Grok 4.6 (Medium) by SpaceXAI? 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
Grok 4.6 (Medium) scores 31.7 points higher (42.8 vs 11.1) but costs 29× as much to run the benchmark ($1557 vs $53.1; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Grok 4.6 (Medium) when you need intelligence above 11.1, and Granite 4.2 8B when 11.1 is enough.
| Metric | Granite 4.2 8B | Grok 4.6 (Medium) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 11.1 | 42.8 | +285.6% Grok 4.6 (Medium) is 3.9× more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $53.07 | $1,557.04 | +2833.9% Grok 4.6 (Medium) is 29× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 39.25s | 31.56s | −19.6% Grok 4.6 (Medium) is 19.6% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.06 / $0.25 | $2.00 / $6.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text | Text, Image |
Grok 4.6 (Medium) vs Granite 4.2 8B: 285.6% more intelligence, 2833.9% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 19.6% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Granite 4.2 8B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (High) scores 32.90 for $47.9.
- Grok 4.6 (Medium) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
Granite 4.2 8BGrok 4.6 (Medium)Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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