Grok 4.6 (Low) vs Qwen3 Coder Next
Which is better for the money: Grok 4.6 (Low) by SpaceXAI or Qwen3 Coder 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
Grok 4.6 (Low) scores 25.9 points higher (35.1 vs 9.2) but costs 1.5× as much to run the benchmark ($614 vs $405; premium vs mid-range cost classes). Pick Grok 4.6 (Low) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Qwen3 Coder Next.
| Metric | Grok 4.6 (Low) | Qwen3 Coder Next | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 35.1 | 9.2 | −73.8% Qwen3 Coder Next is 73.8% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $613.92 | $405.10 | −34.0% Qwen3 Coder Next is 34.0% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 13.36s | 6.44s | −51.8% Qwen3 Coder Next is 51.8% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $6.00 | $0.31 / $1.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Qwen3 Coder Next vs Grok 4.6 (Low): 73.8% less intelligence, 34.0% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 51.8% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Grok 4.6 (Low) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (High) scores 50.20 for $521.
- Qwen3 Coder Next is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Medium) scores 47.80 for $361.
Grok 4.6 (Low)Qwen3 Coder 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/grok-4-6-low/qwen3-coder-next · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/grok-4-6-low/qwen3-coder-next?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill