Model comparison

Granite 4.2 8B vs Qwen3 Max

Qwen3 Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.7 to 40.5 on the Noometry Index. Granite 4.2 8B costs 22× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3 Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 11 shared benchmarks.

Granite 4.2 8B IBM

40.5

Rank #148 Confirmed

Qwen3 Max

Alibaba (Qwen)

43.7

Rank #87 Confirmed

Summary

They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 8B scores higher in 1 category and Qwen3 Max in 6 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen3 Max leads 62.4 to 49.6.
Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.25 per million input/output tokens, against $1.20 / $6 for Qwen3 Max.
Qwen3 Max accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 131K.
Granite 4.2 8B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3 Max specifications
	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
Provider	IBM	Alibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index	40.5	43.7
Released	—	2025-09-23
Weights	Open	Proprietary
Context window	131K	262K
Max output	118K	66K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.06	$1.20
Output $ / M tokens	$0.25	$6
Results tracked	11	33

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Category by category

Coding Qwen3 Max leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 40.5 (#137), Qwen3 Max: 43.0 (#93)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Coding	1380	1456
ALE-Bench	—	370.45

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3 Max: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
Vending-Bench 2	—	71.56

Reasoning Granite 4.2 8B leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 26.6 (#131), Qwen3 Max: 22.6 (#190)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Hard Prompts	1329	1448
Kagi LLM Benchmark	—	72.5%
NYT Connections (extended)	—	30.1%
Chess Puzzles	—	4%
Mystery Game Puzzles	—	5%
DTBench	—	82.1%
LMCA	—	28.3%
Epoch Capabilities Index	—	142.38

Math Not comparable

Granite 4.2 8B: —, Qwen3 Max: 38.7 (#131)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)	—	18.9%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	—	73.3%
LMArena Math	—	1446
MATH Level 5	—	97.1%

Knowledge Qwen3 Max leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 38.4 (#145), Qwen3 Max: 48.1 (#78)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Expert	1384	1455
GPQA Diamond	—	72.6%
SimpleQA Verified	—	48.7%

Multilingual Qwen3 Max leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 44.5 (#178), Qwen3 Max: 53.7 (#62)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Non-English	1302	1429
LMArena Chinese	1366	1478
LMArena Russian	1285	1428
LMArena French	—	1449
LMArena German	—	1463
LMArena Japanese	—	1397
LMArena Korean	—	1399
LMArena Spanish	—	1462

Instruction Following Qwen3 Max leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 68.7 (#184), Qwen3 Max: 74.8 (#87)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Instruction Following	1301	1419

Long Context Qwen3 Max leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 40.3 (#159), Qwen3 Max: 41.6 (#134)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Longer Query	1324	1438
Fiction.LiveBench	—	66.7%
CL-bench	—	14.5%

Writing & Preference Qwen3 Max leads

Granite 4.2 8B: 49.6 (#189), Qwen3 Max: 62.4 (#76)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Granite 4.2 8B	Qwen3 Max
LMArena Text	1320	1439
LMArena Creative Writing	1236	1402
LMArena Multi-Turn	1301	1446

Frequently asked questions

Is Granite 4.2 8B better than Qwen3 Max?

Which is cheaper, Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3 Max?

Granite 4.2 8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.25 per million output tokens; Qwen3 Max lists at $1.20 and $6.

Is Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3 Max better for coding?

Qwen3 Max scores higher on coding benchmarks: 43.0 versus 40.5 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3 Max does, with 262K tokens against 131K.

How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3 Max share?

11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 8B has 11 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3 Max has 33.