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Comparison · 2 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) vs Qwen3 14B

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) comes out ahead, 68 to 54 on our weighted score, though Qwen3 14B is 2.6× cheaper per token.

  1. Our pick

    xAI

    Grok 4.20 (Reasoning)

    Released Mar 9, 2026

    68/100
    • ECI152.0
    • Price$1.25 / $2.50
    • Context1M
    Full specs Remove Grok 4.20 (Reasoning)

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 14B

    Released Apr 29, 2025

    54/100
    • ECI138.2
    • Price$0.35 / $1.40
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 14B

  3. Add a model

    Make it a three-way comparison.

01 — Verdict

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) is our pick

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) is the better all-round choice, scoring 68/100 against Qwen3 14B (54). It leads on capability, inputs & features and context window. Qwen3 14B wins on price. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityGrok 4.20 (Reasoning)Capabilities Index (ECI): Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) 152.0 · Qwen3 14B 138.2
  • Lowest priceQwen3 14BQwen3 14B $0.613 · Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) $1.56 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextGrok 4.20 (Reasoning)Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) 1,000,000 · Qwen3 14B 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsGrok 4.20 (Reasoning)Grok 4.20 (Reasoning): Text, Images, PDFs · Qwen3 14B: Text
  • Self-hostingQwen3 14BPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightGrok 4.20 (Reasoning)Qwen3 14B
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%8163
Price25%4160
Inputs & features15%8035
Context window10%6024
Overall100%68/10054/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) vs Qwen3 14B specifications side by side
SpecificationGrok 4.20 (Reasoning)xAIQwen3 14BAlibaba (Qwen)
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)152.0 (best)138.2
ECI rank#41 of 148 (best)#107 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions89.3% (best)63.8%
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics44.9%—
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics92.2% (best)66.4%
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions30.2%—
Price per million tokens
Input$1.25$0.35 (best)
Output$2.50$1.40 (best)
Cached input$0.20—
Blended (3:1)$1.56$0.613 (best)
Long-context rateOver 200K: $2.50 / $5.00Same rate
Price sourceOfficial xAI APIOfficial Alibaba API
Limits
Context window1,000,000 tokens (best)131,072 tokens
Max output30,000 tokens (best)8,192 tokens
Inputs and features
TextYesYes
ImagesYesNo
PDFsYesNo
AudioNoNo
VideoNoNo
ReasoningYesYes
Tool callingYesYes
Structured outputYesNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpen
API model IDgrok-4.20-0309-reasoningqwen3-14b
API providers11 (best)1
ReleasedMar 9, 2026Apr 29, 2025
Knowledge cutoff—Apr 2025
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.

  • Grok 4.20 (Reasoning)$17.50
  • Qwen3 14B$6.30
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) or Qwen3 14B?

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) is the better all-round choice, scoring 68/100 against Qwen3 14B (54). It leads on capability, inputs & features and context window. Qwen3 14B wins on price. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) or Qwen3 14B?

Qwen3 14B is cheaper at $0.35 input / $1.40 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) costs $1.25 input / $2.50 output per million tokens (official xAI API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.613 per million tokens for Qwen3 14B versus $1.56 for Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) (2.6× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) 152.0 (#41 of 148) and Qwen3 14B 138.2 (#107 of 148). Their confidence ranges do not overlap (149.3–154.4 vs 133.5–140.1), so the gap is a real one. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) 89.3%, Qwen3 14B 63.8%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) 92.2%, Qwen3 14B 66.4%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) and Qwen3 14B yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. Both support tool calling for agent workflows.

Which has the bigger context window?

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) has the largest context window at 1,000,000 tokens, against 131,072 for Qwen3 14B. Maximum output per response: Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) up to 30,000, Qwen3 14B up to 8,192 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) accepts text, images and PDFs; Qwen3 14B accepts text. Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Qwen3 14B publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Grok 4.20 (Reasoning) is the newest, released Mar 9, 2026. Qwen3 14B came out Apr 29, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Qwen3 14B Apr 2025.

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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