Granite 4.2 8B vs Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning)
Which is better for the money: Granite 4.2 8B by IBM or Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning) 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
Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning) scores 7.1 points higher (18.2 vs 11.1) but costs 17× as much to run the benchmark ($896 vs $53.1; premium vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning) when you need intelligence above 11.1, and Granite 4.2 8B when 11.1 is enough.
| Metric | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 11.1 | 18.2 | +64.0% Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reas… is 64.0% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $53.07 | $896.39 | +1589.1% Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reas… is 17× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 63.67s | 46.69s | −26.7% Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reas… is 26.7% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.06 / $0.25 | $0.38 / $2.25 | |
| Input modalities | Text | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning) vs Granite 4.2 8B: 64.0% more intelligence, 1589.1% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 26.7% 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.
- Qwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 51.00 for $662.
Granite 4.2 8BQwen3.6 35B A3B (Reasoning)Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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