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Model comparison

GPT-5.5 vs Qwen3.6-27B

Data verified

Head-to-head evidence from 23 shared benchmark results across 6 categories. Overall scores shown here use the public BenchAlign v5 ranking lane.

OpenAI
73.51/100
Margin
19.7pts
← winning
53.82/100
2 category wins3 category wins

Public leaderboard positions: GPT-5.5 #9 (Estimated); Qwen3.6-27B #93 (Estimated). Intervals and evidence labels describe ranking uncertainty, not a guarantee for a specific workload.

Evidence parity. GPT-5.5 and Qwen3.6-27B share 23 comparable benchmark results. 5 of 8 categories are comparable. 34 results are unique to GPT-5.5; 31 to Qwen3.6-27B.

Updated July 22, 2026
Shared results
23
GPT-5.5 only
34
Qwen3.6-27B only
31
Comparable categories
5 / 8

Pick GPT-5.5 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Qwen3.6-27B only becomes the better choice if mathematics is the priority or you want the cheaper token bill.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 23 shared benchmark results across 6 evidence categories; 5 of 8 categories currently have scoreable aggregates for both models. Treat the verdict as directional until coverage is more balanced.

Why this result

GPT-5.5 is clearly ahead on the BenchAlign aggregate, 73.51 to 53.82. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

GPT-5.5's sharpest advantage is in agentic, where it averages 81.6 against 59.3. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is HLE, 52.2% to 24%. Qwen3.6-27B does hit back in mathematics, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.

GPT-5.5 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $5.00 input / $30.00 output per 1M tokens, versus $0.00 input / $0.00 output per 1M tokens for Qwen3.6-27B. That is roughly Infinityx on output cost alone. GPT-5.5 gives you the larger context window at 1M, compared with 262K for Qwen3.6-27B.

Category breakdown

Exact category averages are shown below. Not measured means BenchLM does not have enough sourced public coverage for that model and category.

Category scores and score margins for GPT-5.5 and Qwen3.6-27B
CategoryGPT-5.5ΔQwen3.6-27B
MathGPT-5.547.6Margin 41.6Qwen3.6-27B89.2
AgenticGPT-5.581.6Margin 22.3Qwen3.6-27B59.3
CodingGPT-5.558.6Margin 18.9Qwen3.6-27B77.5
MultimodalGPT-5.570.4Margin 6.3Qwen3.6-27B76.7
KnowledgeGPT-5.557.8Margin 4.5Qwen3.6-27B53.3
ReasoningGPT-5.585.0MarginNo overlapQwen3.6-27BNot measured

Decisive benchmark drivers

The largest measured benchmark gaps in this matchup, with exact reported values.

More
A · GPT-5.5B · Qwen3.6-27B
  1. HLE

    Knowledge
    Source ↗
    A 52.2%B 24%
    Winner: GPT-5.5Δ 28.2
    HLE: GPT-5.5 scored 52.2%; Qwen3.6-27B scored 24%. GPT-5.5 wins this benchmark.
  2. Terminal-Bench 2.0

    Agentic
    Source ↗
    A 82%B 59.3%
    Winner: GPT-5.5Δ 22.7
    Terminal-Bench 2.0: GPT-5.5 scored 82%; Qwen3.6-27B scored 59.3%. GPT-5.5 wins this benchmark.
  3. GPQA

    Knowledge
    Source ↗
    A 93.6%B 87.8%
    Winner: GPT-5.5Δ 5.8
    GPQA: GPT-5.5 scored 93.6%; Qwen3.6-27B scored 87.8%. GPT-5.5 wins this benchmark.
  4. MMMU-Pro

    Multimodal
    Source ↗
    A 81.2%B 75.8%
    Winner: GPT-5.5Δ 5.4
    MMMU-Pro: GPT-5.5 scored 81.2%; Qwen3.6-27B scored 75.8%. GPT-5.5 wins this benchmark.
  5. SWE-bench Pro

    Coding
    Source ↗
    A 58.6%B 53.5%
    Winner: GPT-5.5Δ 5.1
    SWE-bench Pro: GPT-5.5 scored 58.6%; Qwen3.6-27B scored 53.5%. GPT-5.5 wins this benchmark.

Operational comparison

Runtime and commercial metrics are compared only when both models have a complete sourced value.

MetricGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BComparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokensGPT-5.5$5 input / $30 outputQwen3.6-27B$0 input / $0 outputQwen3.6-27B has the lower combined listed price.
Generation speedtokens per secondGPT-5.5Not availableQwen3.6-27BNot availableA complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first tokenGPT-5.5Not availableQwen3.6-27BNot availableA complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokensGPT-5.51MQwen3.6-27B262KGPT-5.5 lists the larger context window.

Benchmark Deep Dive

AgenticGPT-5.5 wins
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 82%59.3%GPT-5.5 leads
CyberGymSource 81.8%Not comparable
BrowseCompSource 84.4%Not comparable
OSWorld-VerifiedSource 78.7%Not comparable
MCP AtlasSource 75.3%Not comparable
ToolathlonSource 55.6%Not comparable
τ²-bench resultsSource 93.9%94.2%Qwen3.6-27B leads
AA Agentic IndexSource 44.9%27.0%GPT-5.5 leads
APEX-Agents-AASource 37.7%Not comparable
GDPval-AASource 49.5%32.0%GPT-5.5 leads
GDPval-AASource 14901140GPT-5.5 leads
Gert LabsSource 72.93%54.84%GPT-5.5 leads
ResearchClawBenchSource 17.0%Not comparable
OSWorld 2.0Source 13.0%Not comparable
JobBenchSource 42.7%Not comparable
ExploitGymSource 13.4%Not comparable
AA BriefcaseSource 1154Not comparable
AA AutomationBenchSource 42.1%Not comparable
AA EnterpriseOps-GymSource 46.6%Not comparable
AA Harvey LABSource 86.3%Not comparable
AA ITBenchSource 45.8%Not comparable
AA Tau3 BankingSource 31.3%Not comparable
terminalBenchHardSource 60.6%Not comparable
aaTerminalBench21Source 84.3%Not comparable
Claw-EvalSource 72.4%Not comparable
QwenClawBenchSource 53.4%Not comparable
QwenWebBenchSource 1487Not comparable
AndroidWorldSource 70.3%Not comparable
CodingQwen3.6-27B wins
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
SWE-bench ProSource 58.6%53.5%GPT-5.5 leads
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 82.0%59.3%GPT-5.5 leads
Vibe Code BenchSource 69.85%Not comparable
React Native EvalsSource 84.7%Not comparable
cursorBench31Source 59.2%Not comparable
cursorBench32Source 58.4%Not comparable
AA Coding IndexSource 74.9%53.7%GPT-5.5 leads
AA-SciCodeSource 56.1%39.8%GPT-5.5 leads
FrontierCode 1.1 MainSource 43.0%Not comparable
SWE-bench VerifiedSource 77.2%Not comparable
SWE MultilingualSource 71.3%Not comparable
LiveCodeBenchSource 83.9%Not comparable
NL2RepoSource 36.2%Not comparable
Reasoning
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
MRCR v2 64K-128KSource 83.1%Not comparable
MRCR v2 128K-256KSource 87.5%Not comparable
ARC-AGI-2Source 85%Not comparable
AA-LCRSource 74.3%68.7%GPT-5.5 leads
CritPtSource 27.1%1.1%GPT-5.5 leads
KnowledgeGPT-5.5 wins
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
GPQASource 93.6%87.8%GPT-5.5 leads
GPQA-DSource 93.6%Not comparable
HLESource 52.2%24%GPT-5.5 leads
HLE w/o toolsSource 41.4%Not comparable
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource 54.8%37.0%GPT-5.5 leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource 93.5%84.2%GPT-5.5 leads
AA-HLESource 44.3%21.6%GPT-5.5 leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource 20.1%-19.8%GPT-5.5 leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource 56.9%19.2%GPT-5.5 leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource 85.5%48.3%Qwen3.6-27B leads
MMLU-ProSource 86.2%Not comparable
MMLU-ReduxSource 93.5%Not comparable
SuperGPQASource 66%Not comparable
C-EvalSource 91.4%Not comparable
MathQwen3.6-27B wins
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
FrontierMath (legacy)Source 51.7%Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)Source 51.700%Not comparable
FrontierMath v2 (Tier 4)Source 35.400%Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2025Source 93.8%Not comparable
HMMT Nov 2025Source 90.7%Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2026Source 84.3%Not comparable
MMAnswerBenchSource 80.8%Not comparable
AIME26Source 94.1%Not comparable
MultimodalQwen3.6-27B wins
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
MMMU-ProSource 81.2%75.8%GPT-5.5 leads
MMMU-Pro w/ PythonSource 83.2%Not comparable
OfficeQA ProSource 54.1%Not comparable
AA-MMMU-ProSource 79.9%74.6%GPT-5.5 leads
Design Arena WebsiteSource 1282Not comparable
MMMUSource 82.9%Not comparable
RealWorldQASource 84.1%Not comparable
DynaMathSource 85.6%Not comparable
MStarSource 81.4%Not comparable
SimpleVQASource 56.1%Not comparable
CharXivSource 78.4%Not comparable
CC-OCRSource 81.2%Not comparable
CountBenchSource 97.8%Not comparable
RefCOCO (avg)Source 92.5%Not comparable
ERQASource 62.5%Not comparable
Video-MME (with subtitle)Source 87.7%Not comparable
VideoMMMUSource 84.4%Not comparable
MLVU (M-Avg)Source 86.6%Not comparable
V*Source 94.7%Not comparable
Inst. Following
BenchmarkGPT-5.5Qwen3.6-27BResult
AA-IFBenchSource 75.9%67.6%GPT-5.5 leads
Frequently Asked Questions (6)

Which is better, GPT-5.5 or Qwen3.6-27B?

GPT-5.5 is ahead on BenchLM's BenchAlign leaderboard, 73.51 to 53.82. The biggest single separator in this matchup is HLE, where the scores are 52.2% and 24%.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, GPT-5.5 or Qwen3.6-27B?

GPT-5.5 has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 57.8 versus 53.3. Inside this category, AA-Omniscience Index is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, GPT-5.5 or Qwen3.6-27B?

Qwen3.6-27B has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 77.5 versus 58.6. Inside this category, Terminal-Bench 2.0 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, GPT-5.5 or Qwen3.6-27B?

Qwen3.6-27B has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 89.2 versus 47.6. GPT-5.5 stays close enough that the answer can still flip depending on your workload.

Which is better for agentic tasks, GPT-5.5 or Qwen3.6-27B?

GPT-5.5 has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 81.6 versus 59.3. Inside this category, GDPval-AA is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, GPT-5.5 or Qwen3.6-27B?

Qwen3.6-27B has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 76.7 versus 70.4. Inside this category, MMMU-Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Self-host vs API cost

Estimates at 50,000 req/day · 1000 tokens/req average.

GPT-5.5
API / mo$26,250
Self-host / moNot listed
Break-even
Proprietary model — self-hosting not applicable.
Qwen3.6-27B
API / mo$0
Self-host / mo$429
Break-even
Model the full break-even

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Last updated: July 22, 2026

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