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Qwen3.6-35B-A3B vs Qwen3.8-27B

Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

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

Which is better?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Qwen3.8-27B is better at 8 benchmarks (CharXiv-R, GPQA, Humanity's Last Exam, LiveCodeBench v6, NL2Repo, OmniDocBench 1.5, RealWorldQA, SWE-Bench Pro). Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Based on current benchmark, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

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

Choose Qwen3.8-27B

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 8 of 8 shared benchmarks
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Aug 2026

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.8-27B
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Benchmark wins
0 of 8
8 of 8
Input price
— / M
— / M
Output price
— / M
— / M
Context window
—
—
Released
Apr 2026
Aug 2026
License
Apache 2.0
Apache 2.0

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

8 benchmarks

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Qwen3.8-27B is better at 8 benchmarks (CharXiv-R, GPQA, Humanity's Last Exam, LiveCodeBench v6, NL2Repo, OmniDocBench 1.5, RealWorldQA, SWE-Bench Pro).

Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Mon Aug 24 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Playground indexes and blind preference scores

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

7.2B diff

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B has 7.2B more parameters than Qwen3.8-27B, making it 26.0% larger.

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
35.0Bparameters
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.8-27B
27.8Bparameters
35.0B
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
27.8B
Qwen3.8-27B

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Both Qwen3.6-35B-A3B and Qwen3.8-27B support multimodal inputs.

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

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Qwen3.8-27B

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.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Qwen3.8-27B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B was released on 2026-04-16, while Qwen3.8-27B was released on 2026-08-14.

Qwen3.8-27B is 4 months newer than Qwen3.6-35B-A3B.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Apr 16, 2026

4 months ago

Qwen3.8-27B

Aug 14, 2026

1 weeks ago

4mo 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→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Qwen3.6-35B-A3B and Qwen3.8-27B side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
✓ Preferred
Qwen3.8-27B
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Qwen3.6-35B-A3B vs Qwen3.8-27B.

Which is better, Qwen3.6-35B-A3B or Qwen3.8-27B?

Qwen3.8-27B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team and Qwen3.8-27B is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Qwen3.6-35B-A3B compare to Qwen3.8-27B 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%. Qwen3.8-27B scores MathVision: 94.6%, OmniDocBench 1.5: 91.1%, LiveCodeBench v6: 90.3%, CharXiv-R: 90.2%, GPQA: 89.2%.

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