Model comparison
Qwen3.5-Flash vs Step 3.5 Flash
Qwen3.5-Flash and Step 3.5 Flash score almost the same on the Noometry Index (42.5 vs 42.3), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.
Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.
Alibaba (Qwen)
StepFunSummary
- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Qwen3.5-Flash scores higher in 2 categories and Step 3.5 Flash in 6 categories; 4 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Qwen3.5-Flash leads 33.7 to 22.2.
- Step 3.5 Flash is cheaper at $0.10 / $0.30 per million input/output tokens, against $0.10 / $0.40 for Qwen3.5-Flash.
- Qwen3.5-Flash accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 256K.
- Step 3.5 Flash has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Alibaba (Qwen) | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 42.5 | 42.3 |
| Released | 2026-02-23 | 2026-01-29 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |
| Context window | 1M | 256K |
| Max output | 66K | 256K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.10 | $0.10 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.40 | $0.30 |
| Results tracked | 32 | 19 |
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Category by category
Coding Step 3.5 Flash leads
Qwen3.5-Flash: 34.2 (#242), Step 3.5 Flash: 42.4 (#105)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1412 | 1436 |
| LMArena WebDev | 1244 | — |
| ALE-Bench | 221.8 | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Qwen3.5-Flash: —, Step 3.5 Flash: —
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| Vending-Bench 2 | 462.69 | — |
Reasoning Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Qwen3.5-Flash: 33.7 (#72), Step 3.5 Flash: 22.2 (#202)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1403 | 1411 |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 28.4% |
| Chess Puzzles | 21% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 20% | — |
| DTBench | 82.9% | — |
| LMCA | 29.1% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 143.98 | — |
Math Step 3.5 Flash leads
Qwen3.5-Flash: 37.4 (#158), Step 3.5 Flash: 42.6 (#84)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1407 | 1408 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 18.2% | — |
| MathArena Final-Answer Competitions | — | 66.8% |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 84.4% | — |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | 6.2% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | 0% | — |
Knowledge Qwen3.5-Flash leads
Qwen3.5-Flash: 43.2 (#93), Step 3.5 Flash: 39.6 (#132)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1407 | 1421 |
| GPQA Diamond | 82.3% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 20.3% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 10.5% | — |
Multilingual Too close to call
Qwen3.5-Flash: 50.5 (#121), Step 3.5 Flash: 50.5 (#119)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1385 | 1385 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1446 | 1447 |
| LMArena French | 1412 | 1421 |
| LMArena German | 1390 | 1405 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1368 | 1354 |
| LMArena Korean | 1344 | 1352 |
| LMArena Russian | 1379 | 1385 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1400 | 1419 |
Instruction Following Too close to call
Qwen3.5-Flash: 72.6 (#139), Step 3.5 Flash: 73.1 (#124)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1374 | 1385 |
Long Context Too close to call
Qwen3.5-Flash: 42.4 (#124), Step 3.5 Flash: 42.8 (#117)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1392 | 1402 |
Writing & Preference Too close to call
Qwen3.5-Flash: 57.9 (#122), Step 3.5 Flash: 58.8 (#113)
| Benchmark | Qwen3.5-Flash | Step 3.5 Flash |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1397 | 1403 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1343 | 1357 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1393 | 1405 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Qwen3.5-Flash better than Step 3.5 Flash?
Qwen3.5-Flash and Step 3.5 Flash score almost the same on the Noometry Index (42.5 vs 42.3), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.
Which is cheaper, Qwen3.5-Flash or Step 3.5 Flash?
Step 3.5 Flash is cheaper. It lists at $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.30 per million output tokens; Qwen3.5-Flash lists at $0.10 and $0.40.
Is Qwen3.5-Flash or Step 3.5 Flash better for coding?
Step 3.5 Flash scores higher on coding benchmarks: 42.4 versus 34.2 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3.5-Flash does, with 1M tokens against 256K.
How many benchmarks do Qwen3.5-Flash and Step 3.5 Flash share?
17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Qwen3.5-Flash has 32 scored results on Noometry and Step 3.5 Flash has 19.