Model Comparison
Phi 4 Reasoning vs Qwen3 VL 4B ThinkingWhich is better in 2026?
Phi 4 Reasoning shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.
Verdict: Phi 4 Reasoning vs Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking — which is better?
Phi 4 Reasoning (by Microsoft) and Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking (by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team) are two of the AI models people compare most. Here is how they stack up on benchmarks, price and capabilities, and which one to pick in 2026.
Phi 4 Reasoning outperforms in 3 benchmarks (GPQA, IFEval, MMLU-Pro), while Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking is better at 1 benchmark (AIME 2025). Phi 4 Reasoning shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.
Choose Phi 4 Reasoning if…
- you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 3 of 4 shared benchmarks
Choose Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking if…
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Sep 2025
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
Phi 4 Reasoning outperforms in 3 benchmarks (GPQA, IFEval, MMLU-Pro), while Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking is better at 1 benchmark (AIME 2025).
Phi 4 Reasoning shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.
Arena Performance
Human preference votes
Model Size
Parameter count comparison
Phi 4 Reasoning has 10.0B more parameters than Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking, making it 250.0% larger.
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking specifies input context (262,144 tokens). Only Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking specifies output context (262,144 tokens).
Input Capabilities
Supported data types and modalities
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking supports multimodal inputs, whereas Phi 4 Reasoning does not.
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Phi 4 Reasoning
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
License
Usage and distribution terms
Phi 4 Reasoning is licensed under MIT, while Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking uses Apache 2.0.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
MIT
Open weights
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Phi 4 Reasoning was released on 2025-04-30, while Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking was released on 2025-09-22.
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking is 5 months newer than Phi 4 Reasoning.
Apr 30, 2025
1.2 years ago
Sep 22, 2025
9 months ago
4mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Phi 4 Reasoning has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2025-03-01, while Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm Phi 4 Reasoning's training data extends to 2025-03-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking's cutoff date.
Mar 2025
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Outputs Comparison
Key Takeaways
Phi 4 Reasoning
View detailsMicrosoft
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
View detailsAlibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Detailed Comparison
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FAQ
Common questions about Phi 4 Reasoning vs Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking.