Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning) vs Qwen3.8 Max
Which is better for the money: Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning) by Alibaba or Qwen3.8 Max 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
Qwen3.8 Max scores 20.0 points higher (40.2 vs 20.2) but costs 1.6× as much to run the benchmark ($3172 vs $2022; both flagship class). Pick Qwen3.8 Max when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning).
| Metric | Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning) | Qwen3.8 Max | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 20.2 | 40.2 | +99.0% Qwen3.8 Max is 99.0% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $2,022.49 | $3,172.37 | +56.9% Qwen3.8 Max is 56.9% more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 14.28s | 63.35s | +343.6% Qwen3.8 Max is 343.6% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.50 / $3.00 | $2.00 / $6.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Video | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8 Max vs Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning): 99.0% more intelligence, 56.9% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 343.6% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
- Qwen3.8 Max is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Kimi K3.1 Pro scores 55.10 for $3117.
Qwen3.8 27B (Non-reasoning)Qwen3.8 MaxToday'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/qwen3-8-27b-non-reasoning/qwen3-8-max-0803 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/qwen3-8-27b-non-reasoning/qwen3-8-max-0803?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill