Qwen3.5 Flash vs Qwen3.8 Max vs Gemma 4 31B IT
Qwen3.5 Flash comes out ahead, 75 to 69 and 69 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.
- Our pick
Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen3.5 Flash
75/100- ECI144.0
- Price$0.10 / $0.40
- Context1M
- Alibaba (Qwen)
Qwen3.8 Max
69/100- ECI156.6
- Price$2.00 / $6.00
- Context1M
GoogleGemma 4 31B IT
69/100- ECI142.8
- Price$0.14 / $0.40
- Context262K
Qwen3.5 Flash is our pick
Qwen3.5 Flash is the better all-round choice, scoring 75/100 against Qwen3.8 Max (69) and Gemma 4 31B IT (69). It leads on price. Qwen3.8 Max wins on capability and inputs & features. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
- CapabilityQwen3.8 MaxCapabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.8 Max 156.6 · Qwen3.5 Flash 144.0 · Gemma 4 31B IT 142.8
- Lowest priceQwen3.5 FlashQwen3.5 Flash $0.175 · Gemma 4 31B IT $0.205 · Qwen3.8 Max $3.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
- Longest contextQwen3.5 Flash and Qwen3.8 MaxQwen3.5 Flash 1,000,000 · Qwen3.8 Max 1,000,000 · Gemma 4 31B IT 262,144 tokens
- Widest inputsQwen3.8 MaxQwen3.5 Flash: Text, Images, Video · Qwen3.8 Max: Text, Images, PDFs, Video · Gemma 4 31B IT: Text, Images
- Self-hostingGemma 4 31B ITPublishes downloadable weights
| Measure | Weight | Qwen3.5 Flash | Qwen3.8 Max | Gemma 4 31B IT |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI) | 50% | 71 | 86 | 69 |
| Price | 25% | 86 | 27 | 83 |
| Inputs & features | 15% | 80 | 90 | 70 |
| Context window | 10% | 60 | 60 | 37 |
| Overall | 100% | 75/100 | 69/100 | 69/100 |
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Qwen3.5 FlashAlibaba (Qwen) | Qwen3.8 MaxAlibaba (Qwen) | Gemma 4 31B ITGoogle |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | 144.0 | 156.6 (best) | 142.8 |
| ECI rank | #82 of 148 | #20 of 148 (best) | #86 of 148 |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 82.3% | 92.7% (best) | 75.8% |
| FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics | 18.3% | 74.7% (best) | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 84.4% | 99.4% (best) | 73.3% |
| SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions | 20.3% | 45.8% (best) | 10.4% |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | $0.10 (best) | $2.00 | $0.14 |
| Output | $0.40 (best) | $6.00 | $0.40 (best) |
| Cached input | $0.01 (best) | $0.25 | — |
| Blended (3:1) | $0.175 (best) | $3.00 | $0.205 |
| Long-context rate | Same rate | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | Official Alibaba API | Official Alibaba API | Median of 30 providers |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 1,000,000 tokens (best) | 1,000,000 tokens (best) | 262,144 tokens |
| Max output | 65,536 tokens | 131,072 tokens (best) | 32,768 tokens |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| PDFs | No | Yes | No |
| Audio | No | No | No |
| Video | Yes | Yes | No |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yeslow · medium · xhigh | Yes |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | Proprietary | Proprietary | Open |
| API model ID | qwen3.5-flash | qwen3.8-max | gemma-4-31b-it |
| API providers | 8 | 25 | 38 (best) |
| Released | Feb 23, 2026 | Aug 3, 2026 | Apr 2, 2026 |
| Knowledge cutoff | — | — | — |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Qwen3.5 Flash$1.80
- Qwen3.8 Max$32.00
- Gemma 4 31B IT$2.20
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Qwen3.5 Flash, Qwen3.8 Max or Gemma 4 31B IT?
Qwen3.5 Flash is the better all-round choice, scoring 75/100 against Qwen3.8 Max (69) and Gemma 4 31B IT (69). It leads on price. Qwen3.8 Max wins on capability and inputs & features. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
Which is cheaper, Qwen3.5 Flash, Qwen3.8 Max or Gemma 4 31B IT?
Qwen3.5 Flash is cheaper at $0.10 input / $0.40 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). Gemma 4 31B IT costs $0.14 input / $0.40 output per million tokens (median across 30 API providers); Qwen3.8 Max costs $2.00 input / $6.00 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.175 per million tokens for Qwen3.5 Flash versus $0.205 for Gemma 4 31B IT (1.2× as much) and $3.00 for Qwen3.8 Max (17× as much).
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
Qwen3.8 Max scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.8 Max 156.6 (#20 of 148), Qwen3.5 Flash 144.0 (#82 of 148) and Gemma 4 31B IT 142.8 (#86 of 148). Their confidence ranges do not overlap (154.5–158.8 vs 141.6–145.5), so the gap is a real one. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Qwen3.8 Max 92.7%, Qwen3.5 Flash 82.3%, Gemma 4 31B IT 75.8%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Qwen3.8 Max 99.4%, Qwen3.5 Flash 84.4%, Gemma 4 31B IT 73.3%; SimpleQA Verified — Qwen3.8 Max 45.8%, Qwen3.5 Flash 20.3%, Gemma 4 31B IT 10.4%.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Qwen3.5 Flash, Qwen3.8 Max and Gemma 4 31B IT yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Qwen3.8 Max 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?
Qwen3.5 Flash and Qwen3.8 Max have the largest context windows (1,000,000 and 1,000,000 tokens), against 262,144 for Gemma 4 31B IT. Maximum output per response: Qwen3.5 Flash up to 65,536, Qwen3.8 Max up to 131,072, Gemma 4 31B IT up to 32,768 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Qwen3.5 Flash accepts text, images and video; Qwen3.8 Max accepts text, images, PDFs and video; Gemma 4 31B IT accepts text and images. Qwen3.8 Max handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
Gemma 4 31B IT publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Qwen3.5 Flash and Qwen3.8 Max is proprietary.
Which is newer?
Qwen3.8 Max is the newest, released Aug 3, 2026. Gemma 4 31B IT came out Apr 2, 2026; Qwen3.5 Flash came out Feb 23, 2026.
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.
