Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct vs MiniMax-M2.5 vs Qwen3.5 Plus
Qwen3.5 Plus comes out ahead, 66 to 62 and 61 on our weighted score, though Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct is 2.6× cheaper per token.
MetaLlama 4 Scout 17B Instruct
62/100- ECI129.7
- Price$0.225 / $0.69
- Context10M
MiniMaxMiniMax-M2.5
61/100- ECI146.7
- Price$0.30 / $1.20
- Context205K
- Our pick
Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen3.5 Plus
66/100- ECI146.8
- Price$0.40 / $2.40
- Context1M
Qwen3.5 Plus is our pick
Qwen3.5 Plus is the better all-round choice, scoring 66/100 against Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct (62) and MiniMax-M2.5 (61). It leads on inputs & features. Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct wins on price and context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
- CapabilityQwen3.5 PlusCapabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.5 Plus 146.8 · MiniMax-M2.5 146.7 · Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct 129.7
- Lowest priceLlama 4 Scout 17B InstructLlama 4 Scout 17B Instruct $0.341 · MiniMax-M2.5 $0.525 · Qwen3.5 Plus $0.90 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
- Longest contextLlama 4 Scout 17B InstructLlama 4 Scout 17B Instruct 10,000,000 · Qwen3.5 Plus 1,000,000 · MiniMax-M2.5 204,800 tokens
- Widest inputsQwen3.5 PlusLlama 4 Scout 17B Instruct: Text, Images · MiniMax-M2.5: Text · Qwen3.5 Plus: Text, Images, Video
- Self-hostingLlama 4 Scout 17B Instruct and MiniMax-M2.5Publishes downloadable weights
| Measure | Weight | Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct | MiniMax-M2.5 | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI) | 50% | 52 | 74 | 74 |
| Price | 25% | 72 | 63 | 52 |
| Inputs & features | 15% | 50 | 35 | 70 |
| Context window | 10% | 100 | 32 | 60 |
| Overall | 100% | 62/100 | 61/100 | 66/100 |
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Llama 4 Scout 17B InstructMeta | MiniMax-M2.5MiniMax | Qwen3.5 PlusAlibaba (Qwen) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | 129.7 | 146.7 | 146.8 (best) |
| ECI rank | #126 of 148 | #66 of 148 | #65 of 148 (best) |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 51.8% | — | 84.9% (best) |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 7.8% | — | 86.7% (best) |
| SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions | — | — | 25.4% |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | $0.225 (best) | $0.30 | $0.40 |
| Output | $0.69 (best) | $1.20 | $2.40 |
| Cached input | — | $0.03 | — |
| Blended (3:1) | $0.341 (best) | $0.525 | $0.90 |
| Long-context rate | Same rate | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | Median of 4 providers | Official MiniMax (minimax.io) API | Official Alibaba API |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 10,000,000 tokens (best) | 204,800 tokens | 1,000,000 tokens |
| Max output | 16,384 tokens | 131,072 tokens (best) | 65,536 tokens |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | Yes | No | Yes |
| PDFs | No | No | No |
| Audio | No | No | No |
| Video | No | No | Yes |
| Reasoning | No | Yes | Yes |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | No | No | No |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | Open | Open | Proprietary |
| API model ID | — | MiniMax-M2.5 | qwen3.5-plus |
| API providers | 4 | 21 (best) | 10 |
| Released | Apr 5, 2025 | Feb 12, 2026 | Feb 16, 2026 |
| Knowledge cutoff | Aug 2024 | — | Apr 2025 |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct$3.63
- MiniMax-M2.5$5.40
- Qwen3.5 Plus$8.80
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct, MiniMax-M2.5 or Qwen3.5 Plus?
Qwen3.5 Plus is the better all-round choice, scoring 66/100 against Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct (62) and MiniMax-M2.5 (61). It leads on inputs & features. Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct wins on price and context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
Which is cheaper, Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct, MiniMax-M2.5 or Qwen3.5 Plus?
Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct is cheaper at $0.225 input / $0.69 output per million tokens (median across 4 API providers). MiniMax-M2.5 costs $0.30 input / $1.20 output per million tokens (official MiniMax (minimax.io) API price); Qwen3.5 Plus costs $0.40 input / $2.40 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.341 per million tokens for Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct versus $0.525 for MiniMax-M2.5 (1.5× as much) and $0.90 for Qwen3.5 Plus (2.6× as much).
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
Qwen3.5 Plus scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.5 Plus 146.8 (#65 of 148), MiniMax-M2.5 146.7 (#66 of 148) and Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct 129.7 (#126 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (144.6–148.1 vs 142.3–147.9), so treat the gap as small.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct, MiniMax-M2.5 and Qwen3.5 Plus yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Qwen3.5 Plus leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.
Which has the bigger context window?
Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct has the largest context window at 10,000,000 tokens, against 1,000,000 for Qwen3.5 Plus and 204,800 for MiniMax-M2.5. Maximum output per response: Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct up to 16,384, MiniMax-M2.5 up to 131,072, Qwen3.5 Plus up to 65,536 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct accepts text and images; MiniMax-M2.5 accepts text; Qwen3.5 Plus accepts text, images and video. Qwen3.5 Plus handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct and MiniMax-M2.5 publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Qwen3.5 Plus is proprietary.
Which is newer?
Qwen3.5 Plus is the newest, released Feb 16, 2026. MiniMax-M2.5 came out Feb 12, 2026; Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct came out Apr 5, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct Aug 2024, Qwen3.5 Plus 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.
Related comparisons
- Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct vs Mistral Small 3.1 24BMistral AI · ECI 127.5
- Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct vs DeepSeek-V3DeepSeek · ECI 132.3
- Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct vs Gemma 3 27B ITGoogle · ECI 130.0
- Llama 4 Scout 17B Instruct vs Qwen3 8BAlibaba (Qwen) · ECI 136.2
- MiniMax-M2.5 vs GPT-5.4 nanoOpenAI · ECI 145.8
- MiniMax-M2.5 vs DeepSeek V3.2DeepSeek · ECI 146.3
