Pairwise benchmark snapshot · Aug 17, 2026noindex (thin pair)

Qwen 3 Max vs Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B benchmark

Name: Qwen 3 Max vs Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B AI benchmark comparison
Creator: CompareLLM
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

This page compares Qwen 3 Max (Alibaba) and Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B (Alibaba) using the latest snapshots we have as of Aug 17, 2026. Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B wins on output price at $2.34/1M. Qwen 3 Max has the larger context window (262k tokens). Every cell below is a dated snapshot from a named public source — we do not invent missing scores, and we do not run SWE-bench ourselves.

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Alibaba

Qwen 3 Max

Alibaba flagship. Strong math and multilingual code.

Elo 1,518$3.9/1M out

Alibaba

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Auto-discovered from OpenRouter (qwen/qwen3.5-397b-a17b). Preview until a second source matches.

$2.34/1M out

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Model A

Model B

Quick vs:vs Claude Opus 4.5 vs Claude Opus 4.6 vs Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Claude 3.7 Sonnet

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

Qwen 3 Max (7)vsQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B (2)

Qwen 3 Max: 7W (78%)Overall: Qwen 3 MaxQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 2W (22%)

← Qwen 3 Max1 tiesQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B →

Qwen 3 Max (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

Preference Elo, Coding proficiency, SWE-bench & LiveBench accuracy

Preference Elo

1,518vs—

Coding Elo

1,526vs—

SWE-bench

67.8%vs—

LiveBench

69.4%vs—

GPQA Diamond

83.1%vs—

Qwen 3 Max: 5WQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 0W

Qwen 3 Max (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

80 tok/svs—

Time to first token

280 msvs—

Qwen 3 Max: 2WQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 0W

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$3.9/1Mvs$2.34/1M

Input price

$0.78/1Mvs$0.39/1M

Context window

262kvs262k

Qwen 3 Max: 0WQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 2W

Capability Matchup Radar

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

Each spoke is a skill. Farther from the center is better (0–100th percentile). Tap any dot to inspect details.

Tap any node to inspect

Percentile 0–100

Dimensional AdvantageQwen 3 Max 4/6

Preference Elo

No shared data

Throughput Speed

No shared data

Token Price Efficiency

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

$1.56/1M cheaper

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

—

Elo

High is better

1,518

EloHigh is better

—

Code Elo

High is better

1,526

Code EloHigh is better

—

LiveBench

High is better

69.4%

LiveBenchHigh is better

—

SWE-bench

High is better

67.8%

SWE-benchHigh is better

—

GPQA

High is better

83.1%

GPQAHigh is better

—

TTFT

Low is better

280 ms

TTFTLow is better

—

Speed

High is better

80 tok/s

SpeedHigh is better

—

In $

Low is better

$0.78 / 1M

In $Low is better

$0.39 / 1M+100%

Out $

Low is better

$3.90 / 1M

Out $Low is better

$2.34 / 1M+67%

Context

High is better

262k

ContextHigh is better

262k

Interactive Simulator (USD)

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Simulate monthly production API costs in USD (US Dollar).

Save up to 43% with Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Monthly Volume50M tokens/mo

Quick Presets:

Token Ratio (In vs Out)70% In / 30% Out

RAG / Search (10% out)Coding / Chat (50% out)

Qwen 3 Max$85.80 / mo

In: $27.3Out: $58.5

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B$48.75 / mo

In: $13.65Out: $35.1

Estimated Cost Delta

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B is estimated to save $37.05/month ($445/year).

Based on 50M tokens (30% gen)

Key Selection Recommendations

1
Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B:Pick Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B when you are optimizing output cost.

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsinsufficient data

Need SWE-bench on both sides.

High-volume chatQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Lower output list price ($2.34/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIinsufficient data

Need TTFT on both sides.

Long-document RAGQwen 3 Max

Larger window (262k).

Screenshots / visionQwen 3 Max

Qwen 3 Max is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	insufficient data	Need SWE-bench on both sides.
High-volume chat	Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B	Lower output list price ($2.34/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	insufficient data	Need TTFT on both sides.
Long-document RAG	Qwen 3 Max	Larger window (262k).
Screenshots / vision	Qwen 3 Max	Qwen 3 Max is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

View all news

launchApr 18, 2026

Qwen 3 Max: Alibaba’s flagship for math and multilingual code

Closed flagship. Strong math. Compare to Sol and Opus on GPQA and SWE-bench, not on brand heat.

launchSep 20, 2025

Qwen3 235B: the open MoE Qwen, not the Max SKU

Sep 2025 open-weight mixture-of-experts. Self-host path. Don’t confuse it with Qwen 3 Max.

Community Sentiment

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CompareLLM Matrix

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LIVE

Alibaba

Qwen 3 Max

Elo 1,518

LiveBench69.4%

SWE-bench67.8%

Speed80 tok/s

Output cost$3.9/1M

Alibaba

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Elo n/a

LiveBench—

SWE-bench—

Speed—

Output cost$2.34/1M

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, Qwen 3 Max or Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B?: We do not have preference Elo for both models, so we do not declare an overall winner. Compare the metrics that exist.
Which is better at coding, Qwen 3 Max or Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B?: SWE-bench is missing for at least one model, so we do not rank coding from a single number.
Which is cheaper to run in production?: Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B output tokens are $2.34/1M versus $3.9/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.
Which is faster, Qwen 3 Max or Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B?: We do not have TTFT for both models.
Which has the larger context window?: Qwen 3 Max accepts 262k tokens versus 262k.
Can I self-host either model?: Neither model is marked open-weights here. You are comparing hosted APIs.
Are these scores from CompareLLM’s own evals?: No. V1 aggregates public leaderboards (and optional first-party latency pings). Each cell names its source and date. Read /methodology.
What does preference Elo mean on this page?: Preference Elo is a crowd vote from LMArena / Arena. People see two hidden answers and pick the one they like more. The model that wins more often gets a higher Elo. That means people preferred it — not that it passed a school test. It is not SWE-bench, not accuracy, and not a number we invent. Qwen 3 Max and Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B Elo cells are dated snapshots from the named source — we do not compute Arena ourselves.

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons

All Qwen 3 Max matchups →|All Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B matchups →

Qwen QwQ 32B vs Qwen 3 Max Qwen 2.5 Plus vs Qwen 3 Max Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Qwen 3 Max Kimi K3 vs Qwen 3 Max Gemini 3.6 Flash vs Qwen 3 Max Gemini 3.7 Flash vs Qwen 3 Max

Qwen 3 Max vs Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B benchmark

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Matchup Breakdown

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Category wins across intelligence, speed, and pricing efficiency.

Qwen 3 Max (7)vsQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B (2)

Qwen 3 Max: 7W (78%)Overall: Qwen 3 MaxQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 2W (22%)

← Qwen 3 Max1 tiesQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B →

Qwen 3 Max (5/5)

Intelligence & Reasoning

Preference Elo, Coding proficiency, SWE-bench & LiveBench accuracy

Preference Elo

1,518vs—

Coding Elo

1,526vs—

SWE-bench

67.8%vs—

LiveBench

69.4%vs—

GPQA Diamond

83.1%vs—

Qwen 3 Max: 5WQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 0W

Qwen 3 Max (2/2)

Speed & Latency

Generation throughput and time to first token responsiveness

Output speed

80 tok/svs—

Time to first token

280 msvs—

Qwen 3 Max: 2WQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 0W

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B (2/3)

Pricing & Capacity

Cost per million tokens and max context window length

Output price

$3.9/1Mvs$2.34/1M

Input price

$0.78/1Mvs$0.39/1M

Context window

262kvs262k

Qwen 3 Max: 0WQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B: 2W

Recommended Workload Routing

Repo / coding agentsinsufficient data

Need SWE-bench on both sides.

High-volume chatQwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Lower output list price ($2.34/1M).

Voice / low-latency UIinsufficient data

Need TTFT on both sides.

Long-document RAGQwen 3 Max

Larger window (262k).

Screenshots / visionQwen 3 Max

Qwen 3 Max is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Target Workload	Recommended Pick	Evaluation Rationale
Repo / coding agents	insufficient data	Need SWE-bench on both sides.
High-volume chat	Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B	Lower output list price ($2.34/1M).
Voice / low-latency UI	insufficient data	Need TTFT on both sides.
Long-document RAG	Qwen 3 Max	Larger window (262k).
Screenshots / vision	Qwen 3 Max	Qwen 3 Max is the side marked multimodal in the catalog.

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better overall, Qwen 3 Max or Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B?

We do not have preference Elo for both models, so we do not declare an overall winner. Compare the metrics that exist.

Which is better at coding, Qwen 3 Max or Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B?

SWE-bench is missing for at least one model, so we do not rank coding from a single number.

Which is cheaper to run in production?

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B output tokens are $2.34/1M versus $3.9/1M. Input prices and retry rates still move the real bill.

Which is faster, Qwen 3 Max or Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B?

We do not have TTFT for both models.

Which has the larger context window?

Qwen 3 Max accepts 262k tokens versus 262k.

Can I self-host either model?

Neither model is marked open-weights here. You are comparing hosted APIs.

Are these scores from CompareLLM’s own evals?

No. V1 aggregates public leaderboards (and optional first-party latency pings). Each cell names its source and date. Read /methodology.

What does preference Elo mean on this page?

Preference Elo is a crowd vote from LMArena / Arena. People see two hidden answers and pick the one they like more. The model that wins more often gets a higher Elo. That means people preferred it — not that it passed a school test. It is not SWE-bench, not accuracy, and not a number we invent. Qwen 3 Max and Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B Elo cells are dated snapshots from the named source — we do not compute Arena ourselves.

Swap or Add Any Model to this Matchup

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Intelligence & Reasoning

Speed & Latency

Pricing & Capacity

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

No shared data

No shared data

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

Qwen 3 Max: Alibaba’s flagship for math and multilingual code

Qwen3 235B: the open MoE Qwen, not the Max SKU

Cast Your Matchup Vote

Community Discussions (0)

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CompareLLM Matrix

Qwen 3 Max

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Frequently Asked Questions

Related news

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons

Swap or Add Any Model to this Matchup

Interactive Comparison Diagram

Tug-of-War Matchup Matrix

Intelligence & Reasoning

Speed & Latency

Pricing & Capacity

Multi-Dimensional Capability Radar

No shared data

No shared data

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Full Benchmark Score Matrix

Workload Cost & Savings Calculator

Key Selection Recommendations

Recommended Workload Routing

Related Editorial Dispatches & Benchmark Notes

Qwen 3 Max: Alibaba’s flagship for math and multilingual code

Qwen3 235B: the open MoE Qwen, not the Max SKU

Cast Your Matchup Vote

Community Discussions (0)

Share card

CompareLLM Matrix

Qwen 3 Max

Qwen: Qwen3.5 397B A17B

Frequently Asked Questions

Related news

Similar Head-to-Head Comparisons