Model Comparison

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B vs GLM-5.2Which is better in 2026?

GLM-5.2 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Verdict: Qwen3.6-35B-A3B vs GLM-5.2 — which is better?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B (by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team) and GLM-5.2 (by Zhipu AI) 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.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while GLM-5.2 is better at 10 benchmarks (AIME 2026, GPQA, HMMT 2025, HMMT Feb 26, Humanity's Last Exam, IMO-AnswerBench, MCP Atlas, NL2Repo, SWE-Bench Pro, Toolathlon). GLM-5.2 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Choose Qwen3.6-35B-A3B if…

  • you are already invested in the Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team ecosystem

Choose GLM-5.2 if…

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 10 of 10 shared benchmarks
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Jun 2026

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

10 benchmarks

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while GLM-5.2 is better at 10 benchmarks (AIME 2026, GPQA, HMMT 2025, HMMT Feb 26, Humanity's Last Exam, IMO-AnswerBench, MCP Atlas, NL2Repo, SWE-Bench Pro, Toolathlon).

GLM-5.2 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Fri Jul 17 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

718.0B diff

GLM-5.2 has 718.0B more parameters than Qwen3.6-35B-A3B, making it 2051.4% larger.

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
35.0Bparameters
Zhipu AI
GLM-5.2
753.0Bparameters
35.0B
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
753.0B
GLM-5.2

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only GLM-5.2 specifies input context (1,048,576 tokens). Only GLM-5.2 specifies output context (131,072 tokens).

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Zhipu AI
GLM-5.2
Input1,048,576 tokens
Output131,072 tokens
Fri Jul 17 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B supports multimodal inputs, whereas GLM-5.2 does not.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

GLM-5.2

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is licensed under Apache 2.0, while GLM-5.2 uses MIT.

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

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

GLM-5.2

MIT

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B was released on 2026-04-16, while GLM-5.2 was released on 2026-06-16.

GLM-5.2 is 2 months newer than Qwen3.6-35B-A3B.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Apr 16, 2026

3 months ago

GLM-5.2

Jun 16, 2026

1 months ago

2mo 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→

Key Takeaways

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

View details

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team

Supports multimodal inputs
Zhipu AI
Larger context window (1,048,576 tokens)
Higher AIME 2026 score (99.2% vs 92.7%)
Higher GPQA score (91.2% vs 86.0%)
Higher HMMT 2025 score (94.4% vs 90.7%)
Higher HMMT Feb 26 score (92.5% vs 83.6%)
Higher Humanity's Last Exam score (54.7% vs 21.4%)
Higher IMO-AnswerBench score (91.0% vs 78.9%)
Higher MCP Atlas score (76.8% vs 62.8%)
Higher NL2Repo score (48.9% vs 29.4%)
Higher SWE-Bench Pro score (62.1% vs 49.5%)
Higher Toolathlon score (48.2% vs 26.9%)

Detailed Comparison

Interactive Arena

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Qwen3.6-35B-A3B and GLM-5.2 side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
✓ Preferred
GLM-5.2
Open in Playground
AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
Zhipu AI
GLM-5.2

FAQ

Common questions about Qwen3.6-35B-A3B vs GLM-5.2.

Which is better, Qwen3.6-35B-A3B or GLM-5.2?

GLM-5.2 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team and GLM-5.2 is made by Zhipu AI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Qwen3.6-35B-A3B compare to GLM-5.2 in benchmarks?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B scores MMLU-Redux: 93.3%, MMBench-V1.1: 92.8%, AI2D: 92.7%, AIME 2026: 92.7%, RefCOCO-avg: 92.0%. GLM-5.2 scores AIME 2026: 99.2%, HMMT 2025: 94.4%, HMMT Feb 26: 92.5%, GPQA: 91.2%, IMO-AnswerBench: 91.0%.

What are the context window sizes for Qwen3.6-35B-A3B and GLM-5.2?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B supports an unknown number of tokens and GLM-5.2 supports 1.0M tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Qwen3.6-35B-A3B and GLM-5.2?

Key differences include multimodal support (yes vs no), licensing (Apache 2.0 vs MIT). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Qwen3.6-35B-A3B and GLM-5.2?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is developed by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team and GLM-5.2 is developed by Zhipu AI.

Related comparisons