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Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

QwQ Plus vs Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct vs GPT-4.1 mini

GPT-4.1 mini comes out ahead, 62 to 41 and 38 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.

  1. Alibaba (Qwen)

    QwQ Plus

    Released Mar 5, 2025

    38/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.80 / $2.40
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove QwQ Plus

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct

    Released Apr 2025

    41/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.45 / $2.25
    • Context262K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct
  3. Our pick

    OpenAI

    GPT-4.1 mini

    Released Apr 14, 2025

    62/100
    • ECI135.0
    • Price$0.40 / $1.60
    • Context1.05M
    Full specs Remove GPT-4.1 mini
01 — Verdict

GPT-4.1 mini is our pick

GPT-4.1 mini is the better all-round choice, scoring 62/100 against Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct (41) and QwQ Plus (38). It leads on price, inputs & features and context window. 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 priceGPT-4.1 miniGPT-4.1 mini $0.70 · Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct $0.90 · QwQ Plus $1.20 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextGPT-4.1 miniGPT-4.1 mini 1,047,576 · Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct 262,144 · QwQ Plus 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsGPT-4.1 miniQwQ Plus: Text · Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct: Text · GPT-4.1 mini: Text, Images, PDFs
  • Self-hostingQwen3-Coder 30B-A3B InstructPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightQwQ PlusQwen3-Coder 30B-A3B InstructGPT-4.1 mini
Price50%465257
Inputs & features30%352570
Context window20%243761
Overall100%38/10041/10062/100

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.

QwQ Plus vs Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct vs GPT-4.1 mini specifications side by side
SpecificationQwQ PlusAlibaba (Qwen)Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B InstructAlibaba (Qwen)GPT-4.1 miniOpenAI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)——135.0
ECI rank——#115 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions65.4%—65.9% (best)
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics——6.7%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics——44.7%
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions——12.7%
Price per million tokens
Input$0.80$0.45$0.40 (best)
Output$2.40$2.25$1.60 (best)
Cached input——$0.10
Blended (3:1)$1.20$0.90$0.70 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateOver 32K: $0.75 / $3.75Same rate
Price sourceOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial OpenAI API
Limits
Context window131,072 tokens262,144 tokens1,047,576 tokens (best)
Max output8,192 tokens65,536 tokens (best)32,768 tokens
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesNoNoYes
PDFsNoNoYes
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningYesNoNo
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputNoNoYes
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpenProprietary
API model IDqwq-plusqwen3-coder-30b-a3b-instructgpt-4.1-mini
API providers21324 (best)
ReleasedMar 5, 2025Apr 2025Apr 14, 2025
Knowledge cutoffApr 2024Apr 2025Apr 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.

  • QwQ Plus$12.80
  • Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct$9.00
  • GPT-4.1 mini$7.20
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: QwQ Plus, Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct or GPT-4.1 mini?

GPT-4.1 mini is the better all-round choice, scoring 62/100 against Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct (41) and QwQ Plus (38). It leads on price, inputs & features and context window. 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, QwQ Plus, Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct or GPT-4.1 mini?

GPT-4.1 mini is cheaper at $0.40 input / $1.60 output per million tokens (official OpenAI API price). Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct costs $0.45 input / $2.25 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price); QwQ Plus costs $0.80 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 $0.70 per million tokens for GPT-4.1 mini versus $0.90 for Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct (1.3× as much) and $1.20 for QwQ Plus (1.7× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. QwQ Plus has not been scored yet, Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct has not been scored yet and GPT-4.1 mini has an ECI of 135.0.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for QwQ Plus, Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct and GPT-4.1 mini yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. Test both on a sample of your own tasks. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.

Which has the bigger context window?

GPT-4.1 mini has the largest context window at 1,047,576 tokens, against 262,144 for Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct and 131,072 for QwQ Plus. Maximum output per response: QwQ Plus up to 8,192, Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct up to 65,536, GPT-4.1 mini up to 32,768 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

QwQ Plus accepts text; Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct accepts text; GPT-4.1 mini accepts text, images and PDFs. GPT-4.1 mini handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; QwQ Plus and GPT-4.1 mini is proprietary.

Which is newer?

GPT-4.1 mini is the newest, released Apr 14, 2025. Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct came out Apr 2025; QwQ Plus came out Mar 5, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: QwQ Plus Apr 2024, Qwen3-Coder 30B-A3B Instruct Apr 2025, GPT-4.1 mini 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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