Llama 3.1 70B Instruct vs Qwen2 72B Instruct
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct and Qwen2 72B Instruct are closely matched at 7.6 and 5.8 on the LLM Stats Score.
Meta · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct and Qwen2 72B Instruct are closely matched on the overall LLM Stats Score at 7.6 and 5.8.
In the 5 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Llama 3.1 70B Instruct wins 3; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.
Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.
Choose Llama 3.1 70B Instruct
- you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 3 of 5 exact shared results
Choose Qwen2 72B Instruct
- you are already invested in the Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team ecosystem
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Capability indexes
Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks
Individual benchmarks
18 reported for Llama 3.1 70B Instruct · 17 for Qwen2 72B Instruct
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct outperforms in 3 benchmarks (ARC-C, MMLU, MMLU-Pro), while Qwen2 72B Instruct is better at 2 benchmarks (GPQA, HumanEval).
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct has a slight edge in benchmark performance.
Human preference
Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores
Model Size
Parameter count comparison
Qwen2 72B Instruct has 2.0B more parameters than Llama 3.1 70B Instruct, making it 2.9% larger.
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only Llama 3.1 70B Instruct specifies input context (128,000 tokens). Only Llama 3.1 70B Instruct specifies output context (128,000 tokens).
License
Usage and distribution terms
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct is licensed under Llama 3.1 Community License, while Qwen2 72B Instruct uses tongyi-qianwen.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
Llama 3.1 Community License
Open weights
tongyi-qianwen
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Both models were released on 2024-07-23.
They likely represent similar generations of model development.
Jul 23, 2024
2.2 years ago
Jul 23, 2024
2.2 years ago
Knowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.
Unable to compare the recency of their training data.
Outputs Comparison
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against Llama 3.1 70B Instruct and Qwen2 72B Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about Llama 3.1 70B Instruct vs Qwen2 72B Instruct.