The AI arena is free today

Open Superagent

Nova Lite vs Qwen3.8-27B

Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Amazon · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Nova Lite outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Qwen3.8-27B is better at 1 benchmark (GPQA). Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Based on current benchmark, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Nova Lite

  • you want predictable pricing at $0.06/M input and $0.24/M output

Choose Qwen3.8-27B

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 1 of 1 shared benchmarks
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Aug 2026
  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Nova Lite
Amazon
Qwen3.8-27B
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Benchmark wins
0 of 1
1 of 1
Input price
$0.06 / M
— / M
Output price
$0.24 / M
— / M
Context window
300,000
—
Released
Nov 2024
Aug 2026
License
Proprietary
Apache 2.0

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

1 benchmarks

Nova Lite outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Qwen3.8-27B is better at 1 benchmark (GPQA).

Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Tue Aug 25 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Playground indexes and blind preference scores

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Nova Lite specifies input context (300,000 tokens). Only Nova Lite specifies output context (2,048 tokens).

Amazon
Nova Lite
Input300,000 tokens
Output2,048 tokens
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.8-27B
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Tue Aug 25 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Both Nova Lite and Qwen3.8-27B support multimodal inputs.

They are both capable of processing various types of data, offering versatility in application.

Nova Lite

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Qwen3.8-27B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Nova Lite is licensed under a proprietary license, while Qwen3.8-27B uses Apache 2.0.

License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.

Nova Lite

Proprietary

Closed source

Qwen3.8-27B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Nova Lite was released on 2024-11-20, while Qwen3.8-27B was released on 2026-08-14.

Qwen3.8-27B is 21 months newer than Nova Lite.

Nova Lite

Nov 20, 2024

1.8 years ago

Qwen3.8-27B

Aug 14, 2026

1 weeks ago

1.7yr newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Nova Lite and Qwen3.8-27B side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Nova Lite
✓ Preferred
Qwen3.8-27B
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Nova Lite vs Qwen3.8-27B.

Which is better, Nova Lite or Qwen3.8-27B?

Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Nova Lite is made by Amazon and Qwen3.8-27B is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Nova Lite compare to Qwen3.8-27B in benchmarks?

Nova Lite scores GSM8k: 94.5%, ARC-C: 92.4%, DocVQA: 92.4%, IFEval: 89.7%, Translation en→Set1 COMET22: 88.8%. Qwen3.8-27B scores MathVision: 94.6%, OmniDocBench 1.5: 91.1%, LiveCodeBench v6: 90.3%, CharXiv-R: 90.2%, GPQA: 89.2%.

What are the context window sizes for Nova Lite and Qwen3.8-27B?

Nova Lite supports 300K tokens and Qwen3.8-27B supports an unknown number of tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Nova Lite and Qwen3.8-27B?

Key differences include licensing (Proprietary vs Apache 2.0). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Nova Lite and Qwen3.8-27B?

Nova Lite is developed by Amazon and Qwen3.8-27B is developed by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team.

Related comparisons