Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct vs Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct outperforms in 3 benchmarks (Aider-Polyglot, TAU-bench Airline, TAU-bench Retail), while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is better at 1 benchmark (BFCL-v3). Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.
Based on current benchmark, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.
Choose Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct
- you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 3 of 4 shared benchmarks
Choose Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Sep 2025
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct outperforms in 3 benchmarks (Aider-Polyglot, TAU-bench Airline, TAU-bench Retail), while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is better at 1 benchmark (BFCL-v3).
Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.
Arena Performance
Playground indexes and blind preference scores
Model Size
Parameter count comparison
Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct has 400.0B more parameters than Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct, making it 500.0% larger.
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct specifies input context (65,536 tokens). Only Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct specifies output context (65,536 tokens).
License
Usage and distribution terms
Both models are licensed under Apache 2.0.
Both models share the same licensing terms, providing consistent usage rights.
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct was released on 2025-01-31, while Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct was released on 2025-09-10.
Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct is 7 months newer than Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct.
Jan 31, 2025
1.6 years ago
Sep 10, 2025
11 months ago
7mo newerKnowledge 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 Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct and Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about Qwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct vs Qwen3-Next-80B-A3B-Instruct.