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Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Aya Expanse 32B vs Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) vs Qwen-VL OCR

Too close to call on our weighted score (Qwen-VL OCR 36, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) 36, Aya Expanse 32B 33). The right pick depends on what you value most.

  1. Cohere

    Aya Expanse 32B

    Released Oct 24, 2024

    33/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.50 / $1.50
    • Context128K
    Full specs Remove Aya Expanse 32B

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen Plus Character (Japanese)

    Released Jan 2024

    36/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.50 / $1.40
    • Context8K
    Full specs Remove Qwen Plus Character (Japanese)

  3. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen-VL OCR

    Released Oct 28, 2024

    36/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.72 / $0.72
    • Context34K
    Full specs Remove Qwen-VL OCR
01 — Verdict

Too close to call

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (Qwen-VL OCR 36/100, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) 36/100, Aya Expanse 32B 33/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Qwen-VL OCR on price and Aya Expanse 32B for long inputs. The score weighs price 50%, inputs & features 30%, context window 20%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.

  • CapabilityNot enough dataNo independent benchmark covers every model here yet
  • Lowest priceQwen-VL OCRQwen-VL OCR $0.72 · Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) $0.725 · Aya Expanse 32B $0.75 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextAya Expanse 32BAya Expanse 32B 128,000 · Qwen-VL OCR 34,096 · Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) 8,192 tokens
  • Widest inputsQwen-VL OCRAya Expanse 32B: Text · Qwen Plus Character (Japanese): Text · Qwen-VL OCR: Text, Images
  • Self-hostingAya Expanse 32BPublishes downloadable weights (CC-BY-NC-4.0)
How the score is built
MeasureWeightAya Expanse 32BQwen Plus Character (Japanese)Qwen-VL OCR
Price50%565757
Inputs & features30%02525
Context window20%2401
Overall100%33/10036/10036/100

Left out because at least one model lacks the data: capability. The remaining weights were rescaled.

02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.

Aya Expanse 32B vs Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) vs Qwen-VL OCR specifications side by side
SpecificationAya Expanse 32BCohereQwen Plus Character (Japanese)Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen-VL OCRAlibaba (Qwen)
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)———
ECI rank———
Price per million tokens
Input$0.50 (best)$0.50 (best)$0.72
Output$1.50$1.40$0.72 (best)
Cached input———
Blended (3:1)$0.75$0.725$0.72 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceMedian of 1 providersOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial Alibaba API
Limits
Context window128,000 tokens (best)8,192 tokens34,096 tokens
Max output4,000 tokens512 tokens4,096 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesNoNoYes
PDFsNoNoNo
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningNoNoNo
Tool callingNoYesNo
Structured outputNoNoNo
Availability
WeightsOpenCC-BY-NC-4.0ProprietaryProprietary
API model IDc4ai-aya-expanse-32bqwen-plus-character-jaqwen-vl-ocr
API providers2 (best)11
ReleasedOct 24, 2024Jan 2024Oct 28, 2024
Knowledge cutoff—Apr 2024Apr 2024
03 — Cost

What would a month cost?

Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.

  • Aya Expanse 32B$8.00
  • Qwen Plus Character (Japanese)$7.80
  • Qwen-VL OCR$8.64
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Aya Expanse 32B, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) or Qwen-VL OCR?

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (Qwen-VL OCR 36/100, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) 36/100, Aya Expanse 32B 33/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Qwen-VL OCR on price and Aya Expanse 32B for long inputs. The score weighs price 50%, inputs & features 30%, context window 20%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.

Which is cheaper, Aya Expanse 32B, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) or Qwen-VL OCR?

Qwen-VL OCR is cheaper at $0.72 input / $0.72 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) costs $0.50 input / $1.40 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price); Aya Expanse 32B costs $0.50 input / $1.50 output per million tokens (median across 1 API provider). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.72 per million tokens for Qwen-VL OCR versus $0.725 for Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) (1× as much) and $0.75 for Aya Expanse 32B (1× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. Aya Expanse 32B has not been scored yet, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) has not been scored yet and Qwen-VL OCR has not been scored yet.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Aya Expanse 32B, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) and Qwen-VL OCR yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. Test both on a sample of your own tasks. Note that Aya Expanse 32B and Qwen-VL OCR does not support tool calling, which most coding agents need.

Which has the bigger context window?

Aya Expanse 32B has the largest context window at 128,000 tokens, against 34,096 for Qwen-VL OCR and 8,192 for Qwen Plus Character (Japanese). Maximum output per response: Aya Expanse 32B up to 4,000, Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) up to 512, Qwen-VL OCR up to 4,096 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Aya Expanse 32B accepts text; Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) accepts text; Qwen-VL OCR accepts text and images. Qwen-VL OCR handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Aya Expanse 32B publishes its weights (CC-BY-NC-4.0) and can be self-hosted; Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) and Qwen-VL OCR is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Qwen-VL OCR is the newest, released Oct 28, 2024. Aya Expanse 32B came out Oct 24, 2024; Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) came out Jan 2024. Knowledge cutoff: Qwen Plus Character (Japanese) Apr 2024, Qwen-VL OCR Apr 2024.

How do you decide the winner?

Each model gets a 0–100 score on capability (50%, independent benchmark results); price (25%, blended price per million tokens (3 input : 1 output), log scale); inputs & features (15%, image, PDF, audio and video input, tool calling, structured output and reasoning); context window (10%, maximum tokens per request, log scale). Dimensions missing for any model are dropped and the remaining weights rescaled, so every model is judged on the same evidence. Specs and prices come from public model listings and the labs’ own API pages; capability scores come from independent benchmark runs. Data updated Oct 4, 2026.

05 — Keep comparing

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