Grok 4.6 (Xhigh) vs Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning)
Which is better for the money: Grok 4.6 (Xhigh) by SpaceXAI or Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) 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
Grok 4.6 (Xhigh) scores 31.5 points higher (44.2 vs 12.7) but costs 9.6× as much to run the benchmark ($2242 vs $234; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Grok 4.6 (Xhigh) when you need intelligence above 12.7, and Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) when 12.7 is enough.
| Metric | Grok 4.6 (Xhigh) | Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 44.2 | 12.7 | −71.3% Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 … is 71.3% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $2,241.91 | $233.56 | −89.6% Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 … is 89.6% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 40.24s | 21.63s | −46.2% Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 … is 46.2% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $6.00 | $0.23 / $2.30 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) vs Grok 4.6 (Xhigh): 71.3% less intelligence, 89.6% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 46.2% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Grok 4.6 (Xhigh) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) scores 53.60 for $2172.
- Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
Grok 4.6 (Xhigh)Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning)Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
Compare something else
Agents:
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/grok-4-6-xhigh/qwen3-235b-a22b-instruct-2507-reasoning · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/grok-4-6-xhigh/qwen3-235b-a22b-instruct-2507-reasoning?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill