Model Comparison
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct vs Qwen3 30B A3BWhich is better in 2026?
Comparing Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct and Qwen3 30B A3B across benchmarks, pricing, and capabilities.
Verdict: Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct vs Qwen3 30B A3B — which is better?
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct (by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team) and Qwen3 30B A3B (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.
Choose Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct if…
- you are already invested in the Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team ecosystem
Choose Qwen3 30B A3B if…
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Apr 2025
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct and Qwen3 30B A3Bdon't have any common benchmark datasets to compare. They may have been evaluated on different testing suites.
Arena Performance
Human preference votes
Model Size
Parameter count comparison
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct has 42.9B more parameters than Qwen3 30B A3B, making it 140.7% larger.
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only Qwen3 30B A3B specifies input context (128,000 tokens). Only Qwen3 30B A3B specifies output context (128,000 tokens).
Input Capabilities
Supported data types and modalities
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct supports multimodal inputs, whereas Qwen3 30B A3B does not.
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct
Qwen3 30B A3B
License
Usage and distribution terms
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct is licensed under tongyi-qianwen, while Qwen3 30B A3B uses Apache 2.0.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
tongyi-qianwen
Open weights
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct was released on 2024-08-29, while Qwen3 30B A3B was released on 2025-04-29.
Qwen3 30B A3B is 8 months newer than Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct.
Aug 29, 2024
1.8 years ago
Apr 29, 2025
1.1 years ago
8mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-06-30, while Qwen3 30B A3B's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct's training data extends to 2023-06-30, but cannot make a direct comparison without Qwen3 30B A3B's cutoff date.
Jun 2023
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Outputs Comparison
Key Takeaways
Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct
View detailsAlibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 30B A3B
View detailsAlibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Detailed Comparison
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FAQ
Common questions about Qwen2-VL-72B-Instruct vs Qwen3 30B A3B.