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Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking vs Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct are closely matched at 12.9 and 13.8 on the LLM Stats Score. Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is 1.8x cheaper per token.

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct are closely matched on the overall LLM Stats Score at 12.9 and 13.8.

In the 45 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking wins 26; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.

On price, Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is roughly 1.8x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking also accepts a larger context window (262,144 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking

  • you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 26 of 45 exact shared results
  • you process long inputs — it offers a 262,144 token context window

Choose Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

  • cost matters — it's about 1.8x cheaper per token

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
12.9
#265
13.8
#256
Reasoning
14.0
#247
11.2
#273
Agents
6.5
#156
7.0
#153
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
26 of 45
19 of 45
Input price
$0.10 / M
$0.08 / M
Output price
$1.00 / M
$0.50 / M
Context window
262,144
131,072

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

6 shared
Index
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct
Math
15.6#222
11.9#241
Vision
7.7#149
9.8#134
Writing
11.0#74
11.1#73
Multimodal
10.6#125
11.2#122
Finance
16.5#113
15.0#127
1 more shared indexes
Legal
15.9#99
14.5#111
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

48 reported for Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking · 46 for Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

45 shared

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking outperforms in 26 benchmarks (AIME 2025, BFCL-v3, CharadesSTA, CharXiv-D, CharXiv-R, ERQA, Hallusion Bench, HMMT25, LiveBench 20241125, LiveCodeBench v6, MathVision, MathVista-Mini, MMBench-V1.1, MMLU, MMLU-Pro, MMLU-Redux, MMMU-Pro, MMMU (val), MMStar, MuirBench, MVBench, PolyMATH, RealWorldQA, SuperGPQA, VideoMMMU, WritingBench), while Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is better at 18 benchmarks (AI2D, BLINK, CC-OCR, DocVQAtest, IFEval, Include, InfoVQAtest, LVBench, MLVU-M, MMLU-ProX, Multi-IF, OCRBench, OCRBench-V2 (en), OCRBench-V2 (zh), ODinW, OSWorld, ScreenSpot, ScreenSpot Pro).

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking has a slight edge in benchmark performance.

Fri Oct 09 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Pricing Analysis

Price comparison per million tokens

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct costs less

For input processing, Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking ($0.10/1M tokens) is 1.3x more expensive than Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct ($0.08/1M tokens).

For output processing, Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking ($1.00/1M tokens) is 2.0x more expensive than Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct ($0.50/1M tokens).

In conclusion, Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking is more expensive than Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct.*

* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens

Lowest available price from all providers
Fri Oct 09 2026 • llm-stats.com
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
Input tokens$0.10
Output tokens$1.00
Best providerDeepinfra
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct
Input tokens$0.08
Output tokens$0.50
Best providerNovita
Notice missing or incorrect data?

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

5.0B diff

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct has 5.0B more parameters than Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking, making it 125.0% larger.

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
4.0Bparameters
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct
9.0Bparameters
4.0B
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
9.0B
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking accepts 262,144 input tokens compared to Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct's 131,072 tokens. Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking can generate longer responses up to 262,144 tokens, while Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is limited to 32,768 tokens.

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
Input262,144 tokens
Output262,144 tokens
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct
Input131,072 tokens
Output32,768 tokens
Fri Oct 09 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Both Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct support multimodal inputs.

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

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Both models are licensed under Apache 2.0.

Both models share the same licensing terms, providing consistent usage rights.

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Both models were released on 2025-09-22.

They likely represent similar generations of model development.

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking

Sep 22, 2025

1.0 years ago

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Sep 22, 2025

1.0 years ago

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

Provider Availability

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking is available from DeepInfra. Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is available from Novita, DeepInfra.

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking

deepinfra logo
Deepinfra
Input Price:Input: $0.10/1MOutput Price:Output: $1.00/1M

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

novita logo
Novita
Input Price:Input: $0.08/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.50/1M
deepinfra logo
Deepinfra
Input Price:Input: $0.18/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.69/1M
* Prices shown are per million tokens

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking
✓ Preferred
Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking vs Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct.

Which is better, Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking or Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct are closely matched on the LLM Stats Score at 12.9 and 13.8. Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking compare to Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct in benchmarks?

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking scores DocVQAtest: 94.2%, ScreenSpot: 92.9%, MMBench-V1.1: 86.7%, MMLU-Redux: 86.0%, AI2D: 84.9%. Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct scores DocVQAtest: 96.1%, ScreenSpot: 94.4%, OCRBench: 89.6%, AI2D: 85.7%, MMBench-V1.1: 85.0%.

Is Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking cheaper than Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is 1.3x cheaper for input tokens. Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking costs $0.10/M input and $1.00/M output via deepinfra. Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct costs $0.08/M input and $0.50/M output via novita.

What are the context window sizes for Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking supports 262K tokens and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct supports 131K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Qwen3 VL 4B Thinking and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (12.9 vs 13.8), context window (262K vs 131K), input pricing ($0.10 vs $0.08/M). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

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