Mercury 3 vs Qwen3.8 Flash
Qwen3.8 Flash leads the LLM Stats Score 48.1 to 36.1. Mercury 3 is 1.4x cheaper per token.
Inception · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
Qwen3.8 Flash leads the overall LLM Stats Score 48.1 to 36.1, ranking #32 overall.
In the 2 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Qwen3.8 Flash wins 2; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.
On price, Mercury 3 is roughly 1.4x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.
Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.
Choose Mercury 3
- cost matters — it's about 1.4x cheaper per token
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Oct 2026
Choose Qwen3.8 Flash
- overall performance matters — it scores 48.1 and ranks #32 on LLM Stats
- your work emphasizes reasoning and agents — it leads those capability indexes
- you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 2 of 2 exact shared results
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Individual benchmarks
12 reported for Mercury 3 · 22 for Qwen3.8 Flash
Mercury 3 outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Qwen3.8 Flash is better at 2 benchmarks (GPQA, IFBench).
Qwen3.8 Flash 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, Mercury 3 ($0.10/1M tokens) is 1.5x cheaper than Qwen3.8 Flash ($0.15/1M tokens).
For output processing, Mercury 3 ($0.35/1M tokens) is 1.3x cheaper than Qwen3.8 Flash ($0.47/1M tokens).
In conclusion, Qwen3.8 Flash is more expensive than Mercury 3.*
* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Both models have the same input context window of 1,000,000 tokens. Both models can generate responses up to 131,072 tokens.
Input capabilities
Documented input modalities across available providers
Qwen3.8 Flash supports multimodal inputs, whereas Mercury 3 does not.
Qwen3.8 Flash can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Mercury 3
Qwen3.8 Flash
License
Usage and distribution terms
Both models are licensed under proprietary licenses.
Both models have usage restrictions defined by their respective organizations.
Proprietary
Closed source
Proprietary
Closed source
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Mercury 3 was released on 2026-10-19, while Qwen3.8 Flash was released on 2026-08-26.
Mercury 3 is 2 months newer than Qwen3.8 Flash.
Oct 19, 2026
0 days ago
1mo newerAug 26, 2026
1 months ago
Knowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.
Unable to compare the recency of their training data.
Provider Availability
Mercury 3 is available from Inception. Qwen3.8 Flash is available from Novita.
Mercury 3
Qwen3.8 Flash
Outputs Comparison
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against Mercury 3 and Qwen3.8 Flash side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about Mercury 3 vs Qwen3.8 Flash.