Skip to main content

Model comparison

Llama 4 Maverick vs Qwen3.6-35B-A3B

Data verified

Head-to-head evidence from 17 shared benchmark results across 6 categories. Overall scores shown here use the public BenchAlign v5 ranking lane.

23.43/100
Margin
27.9pts
winning →
51.36/100
0 category wins1 category wins

Verified leaderboard positions: Llama 4 Maverick unranked; Qwen3.6-35B-A3B #31

BenchAlign evidence: Llama 4 Maverick supported; Qwen3.6-35B-A3B estimated. Intervals and evidence labels describe ranking uncertainty, not a guarantee for a specific workload.

Evidence parity. Llama 4 Maverick and Qwen3.6-35B-A3B share 17 comparable benchmark results. 1 of 8 categories are comparable. 2 results are unique to Llama 4 Maverick; 41 to Qwen3.6-35B-A3B.

Updated July 15, 2026
Shared results
17
Llama 4 Maverick only
2
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B only
41
Comparable categories
1 / 8

Pick Qwen3.6-35B-A3B if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Llama 4 Maverick only becomes the better choice if you need the larger 1M context window or you would rather avoid the extra latency and token burn of a reasoning model.

Confidence note. This is a partial-evidence comparison with 17 shared benchmark results across 6 evidence categories; 1 of 8 categories currently have scoreable aggregates for both models. Treat the verdict as directional until coverage is more balanced.

Why this result

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is clearly ahead on the provisional aggregate, 59 to 18. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B's sharpest advantage is in mathematics, where it averages 88.2 against 0.7.

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is the reasoning model in the pair, while Llama 4 Maverick is not. That usually helps on harder chain-of-thought-heavy tests, but it can also mean more latency and more token spend in real use. Llama 4 Maverick gives you the larger context window at 1M, compared with 262K for Qwen3.6-35B-A3B.

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 Llama 4 Maverick and Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
CategoryLlama 4 MaverickΔQwen3.6-35B-A3B
MathLlama 4 Maverick0.7Margin 87.5Qwen3.6-35B-A3B88.2
AgenticLlama 4 MaverickNot measuredMarginNo overlapQwen3.6-35B-A3B51.5
CodingLlama 4 MaverickNot measuredMarginNo overlapQwen3.6-35B-A3B73.8
KnowledgeLlama 4 MaverickNot measuredMarginNo overlapQwen3.6-35B-A3B51.8
MultimodalLlama 4 MaverickNot measuredMarginNo overlapQwen3.6-35B-A3B76.3

Operational comparison

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

MetricLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BComparison
Input / output priceUSD per 1M tokensLlama 4 Maverick$0 input / $0 outputQwen3.6-35B-A3BNot availableA complete price comparison is not available.
Generation speedtokens per secondLlama 4 Maverick121 tok/sQwen3.6-35B-A3BNot availableA complete speed comparison is not available.
First-answer latencyseconds to first tokenLlama 4 Maverick0.95 sQwen3.6-35B-A3BNot availableA complete latency comparison is not available.
Context windowmaximum listed tokensLlama 4 Maverick1MQwen3.6-35B-A3B262KLlama 4 Maverick lists the larger context window.

Benchmark Deep Dive

Agentic
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
AA Agentic IndexSource 1.3%21.4%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
τ²-bench resultsSource 17.8%95.3%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
GDPval-AASource 0.0%27.4%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
GDPval-AASource -161049Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 51.5%Not comparable
Claw-EvalSource 68.7%Not comparable
QwenClawBenchSource 52.6%Not comparable
QwenWebBenchSource 1397Not comparable
τ³-bench resultsSource 67.2%Not comparable
VITA-BenchSource 35.6%Not comparable
DeepPlanningSource 25.9%Not comparable
ToolathlonSource 26.9%Not comparable
MCP AtlasSource 62.8%Not comparable
WideResearchSource 60.1%Not comparable
Gert LabsSource 42.65%Not comparable
Coding
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
AA Coding IndexSource 16.3%41.9%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
Terminal-Bench HardSource 6.8%34.8%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
AA-SciCodeSource 33.1%35.8%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
SWE-bench VerifiedSource 73.4%Not comparable
SWE MultilingualSource 67.2%Not comparable
SWE-bench ProSource 49.5%Not comparable
Terminal-Bench 2.0Source 51.5%Not comparable
LiveCodeBenchSource 80.4%Not comparable
NL2RepoSource 29.4%Not comparable
Reasoning
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
AA-LCRSource 46.0%63.7%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
CritPtSource 0.0%0.3%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
Knowledge
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
Artificial Analysis Intelligence IndexSource 14.3%31.6%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
AA-GPQA DiamondSource 67.1%84.1%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
AA-HLESource 4.8%20.2%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
AA-Omniscience IndexSource -41.8%-21.4%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
AA-Omniscience AccuracySource 24.3%18.9%Llama 4 Maverick leads
AA-Omniscience Hallucination RateSource 87.3%49.7%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
MMLU-ProSource 85.2%Not comparable
SuperGPQASource 64.7%Not comparable
C-EvalSource 90%Not comparable
GPQASource 86%Not comparable
HLESource 21.4%Not comparable
MathQwen3.6-35B-A3B wins
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
FrontierMath v2 (Tiers 1-3)Source 0.690%Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2025Source 90.7%Not comparable
HMMT Nov 2025Source 89.1%Not comparable
HMMT Feb 2026Source 83.6%Not comparable
MMAnswerBenchSource 78.9%Not comparable
AIME26Source 92.7%Not comparable
Multimodal
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
AA-MMMU-ProSource 62.1%75.0%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
Design Arena WebsiteSource 905Not comparable
MMMUSource 81.7%Not comparable
MMMU-ProSource 75.3%Not comparable
RealWorldQASource 85.3%Not comparable
OmniDocBench 1.5Source 89.9%Not comparable
CharXivSource 78%Not comparable
SimpleVQASource 58.9%Not comparable
CC-OCRSource 81.9%Not comparable
AI2D_TESTSource 92.7%Not comparable
RefCOCO (avg)Source 92.0%Not comparable
ODINW13Source 50.8%Not comparable
Video-MME (with subtitle)Source 86.6%Not comparable
Video-MME (w/o subtitle)Source 82.5%Not comparable
VideoMMMUSource 83.7%Not comparable
MLVU (M-Avg)Source 86.2%Not comparable
Inst. Following
BenchmarkLlama 4 MaverickQwen3.6-35B-A3BResult
AA-IFBenchSource 43.0%64.4%Qwen3.6-35B-A3B leads
Frequently Asked Questions (2)

Which is better, Llama 4 Maverick or Qwen3.6-35B-A3B?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B is ahead on BenchLM's provisional leaderboard, 59 to 18.

Which is better for math, Llama 4 Maverick or Qwen3.6-35B-A3B?

Qwen3.6-35B-A3B has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 88.2 versus 0.7. Llama 4 Maverick stays close enough that the answer can still flip depending on your workload.

Self-host vs API cost

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

Llama 4 Maverick
API / mo$0
Self-host / mo$2,610
Break-even
Qwen3.6-35B-A3B
API / mo$0
Self-host / moNot listed
Break-even
Proprietary model — self-hosting not applicable.
Model the full break-even

Related Comparisons

Last updated: July 15, 2026

The AI models change fast. We track them for you.

A weekly brief for engineers and researchers covering new models, ranking shifts, and pricing changes.

Free. No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.