Grok-3 Mini vs Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
Grok-3 Mini leads the LLM Stats Score 31.3 to 20.2. Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is 1.0x cheaper per token.
xAI · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
Grok-3 Mini leads the overall LLM Stats Score 31.3 to 20.2, ranking #110 overall.
In the 2 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Grok-3 Mini wins 2; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.
Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct also accepts a larger context window (262,144 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.
Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.
Choose Grok-3 Mini
- overall performance matters — it scores 31.3 and ranks #110 on LLM Stats
- your work emphasizes reasoning and coding — it leads those capability indexes
- you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 2 of 2 exact shared results
Choose Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
- you process long inputs — it offers a 262,144 token context window
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Sep 2025
- you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Capability indexes
Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks
Individual benchmarks
4 reported for Grok-3 Mini · 24 for Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
Grok-3 Mini outperforms in 2 benchmarks (AIME 2025, GPQA), while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is better at 0 benchmarks.
Grok-3 Mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Human preference
Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores
Pricing Analysis
Price comparison per million tokens
For input processing, Grok-3 Mini ($0.30/1M tokens) is 3.3x more expensive than Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct ($0.09/1M tokens).
For output processing, Grok-3 Mini ($0.50/1M tokens) is 2.2x cheaper than Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct ($1.10/1M tokens).
In conclusion, Grok-3 Mini is more expensive than Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct.*
* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct accepts 262,144 input tokens compared to Grok-3 Mini's 128,000 tokens. Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct can generate longer responses up to 262,144 tokens, while Grok-3 Mini is limited to 8,000 tokens.
Input capabilities
Documented input modalities across available providers
Grok-3 Mini supports multimodal inputs, whereas Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct does not.
Grok-3 Mini can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Grok-3 Mini
Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
License
Usage and distribution terms
Grok-3 Mini is licensed under a proprietary license, while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct uses Apache 2.0.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
Proprietary
Closed source
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Grok-3 Mini was released on 2025-02-17, while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct was released on 2025-09-10.
Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is 7 months newer than Grok-3 Mini.
Feb 17, 2025
1.6 years ago
Sep 10, 2025
1.0 years ago
6mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Grok-3 Mini has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2024-11-17, while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm Grok-3 Mini's training data extends to 2024-11-17, but cannot make a direct comparison without Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct's cutoff date.
Nov 2024
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Provider Availability
Grok-3 Mini is available from xAI. Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is available from DeepInfra, Novita.
Grok-3 Mini
Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
Outputs Comparison
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against Grok-3 Mini and Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about Grok-3 Mini vs Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct.