Model comparison

GPT-4.1 mini vs Qwen2.5 7B Instruct

GPT-4.1 mini is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.6 to 29.0 on the Noometry Index. Qwen2.5 7B Instruct costs 2.3× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GPT-4.1 mini's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 12 shared benchmarks.

GPT-4.1 mini OpenAI

33.6

Rank #240 Confirmed

Qwen2.5 7B Instruct Alibaba (Qwen)

29.0

Rank #320 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-4.1 mini scores higher in 4 categories and Qwen2.5 7B Instruct in 3 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in knowledge, where GPT-4.1 mini leads 34.7 to 17.0.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 44.7% for GPT-4.1 mini and 2.5% for Qwen2.5 7B Instruct.
  • Qwen2.5 7B Instruct is cheaper at $0.17 / $0.70 per million input/output tokens, against $0.40 / $1.60 for GPT-4.1 mini.
  • GPT-4.1 mini accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 131K.
  • Qwen2.5 7B Instruct has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GPT-4.1 mini and Qwen2.5 7B Instruct specifications
GPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
ProviderOpenAIAlibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index33.629.0
Released2025-04-142024-09
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M131K
Max output33K8K
Input $ / M tokens$0.40$0.17
Output $ / M tokens$1.60$0.70
Results tracked4715

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Category by category

Coding Qwen2.5 7B Instruct leads

GPT-4.1 mini: 30.6 (#293), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 36.5 (#208)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
BigCodeBench Instruct48.9%37.6%
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)23.9%—
Aider Polyglot32.4%—
SciCode40.4%—
WeirdML37.6%—
LMArena Coding1367—
BigCodeBench Complete—46.1%
CadEval16%—

Agentic & Tool Use GPT-4.1 mini leads

GPT-4.1 mini: 33.3 (#55), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 23.8 (#124)

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard50.5%—
BALROG—7.8%

Reasoning Qwen2.5 7B Instruct leads

GPT-4.1 mini: 10.8 (#340), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 14.8 (#322)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
Chess Puzzles7%0%
DTBench68.8%47.7%
LMCA21.1%6.4%
Epoch Capabilities Index135.01118.51
ARC-AGI-20%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark48.6%—
ARC-AGI-13.5%—
CritPt0%—
LMArena Hard Prompts1349—
Mystery Game Puzzles7%—

Math GPT-4.1 mini leads

GPT-4.1 mini: 24.1 (#270), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 12.6 (#306)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202544.7%2.5%
Omni-MATH49.1%29.4%
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)6.7%—
LMArena Math1343—
MATH Level 587.3%—
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)4.5%—

Knowledge GPT-4.1 mini leads

GPT-4.1 mini: 34.7 (#194), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 17.0 (#286)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
GPQA Diamond65.8%35.5%
MMLU-Pro78.3%53.9%
GPQA (HELM)61.4%34.1%
SimpleQA Verified12.7%—
LMArena Expert1338—
MMLU—72.9%

Multimodal Not comparable

GPT-4.1 mini: 35.8 (#82), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: —

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
LMArena Vision1181—

Multilingual Not comparable

GPT-4.1 mini: 45.7 (#166), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: —

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
LMArena Non-English1318—
LMArena Chinese1329—
LMArena French1358—
LMArena German1351—
LMArena Japanese1290—
LMArena Korean1298—
LMArena Russian1324—
LMArena Spanish1319—

Instruction Following GPT-4.1 mini leads

GPT-4.1 mini: 73.7 (#118), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 63.2 (#231)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
IFEval90.4%74.1%
LMArena Instruction Following1333—

Long Context Not comparable

GPT-4.1 mini: 31.8 (#275), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: —

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
Fiction.LiveBench44.4%—
LMArena Longer Query1344—

Writing & Preference Too close to call

GPT-4.1 mini: 48.6 (#199), Qwen2.5 7B Instruct: 48.8 (#195)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-4.1 miniQwen2.5 7B Instruct
WildBench83.8%73.1%
LMArena Text1340—
LMArena Creative Writing1300—
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1147—
LMArena Multi-Turn1354—

Frequently asked questions

Is GPT-4.1 mini better than Qwen2.5 7B Instruct?

GPT-4.1 mini is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.6 to 29.0 on the Noometry Index. Qwen2.5 7B Instruct costs 2.3× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GPT-4.1 mini's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, GPT-4.1 mini or Qwen2.5 7B Instruct?

Qwen2.5 7B Instruct is cheaper. It lists at $0.17 per million input tokens and $0.70 per million output tokens; GPT-4.1 mini lists at $0.40 and $1.60.

Is GPT-4.1 mini or Qwen2.5 7B Instruct better for coding?

Qwen2.5 7B Instruct scores higher on coding benchmarks: 36.5 versus 30.6 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

GPT-4.1 mini does, with 1.05M tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do GPT-4.1 mini and Qwen2.5 7B Instruct share?

12 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-4.1 mini has 47 scored results on Noometry and Qwen2.5 7B Instruct has 15.

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