Head-to-head comparison across 3benchmark categories. Overall scores shown here use BenchLM's provisional ranking lane.
Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking
59
Qwen3.5-35B-A3B
56
Verified leaderboard positions: Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking unranked · Qwen3.5-35B-A3B #25
Pick Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Qwen3.5-35B-A3B only becomes the better choice if knowledge is the priority or you need the larger 262K context window.
Coding
+11.5 difference
Knowledge
+21.7 difference
Inst. Following
+15.4 difference
Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking
Qwen3.5-35B-A3B
N/A
$0 / $0
N/A
N/A
N/A
N/A
128K
262K
Pick Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Qwen3.5-35B-A3B only becomes the better choice if knowledge is the priority or you need the larger 262K context window.
Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking has the cleaner provisional overall profile here, landing at 59 versus 56. It is a real lead, but still close enough that category-level strengths matter more than the headline number.
Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking's sharpest advantage is in coding, where it averages 69.9 against 58.4. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is GPQA, 57.6% to 84.2%. Qwen3.5-35B-A3B does hit back in knowledge, so the answer changes if that is the part of the workload you care about most.
Qwen3.5-35B-A3B gives you the larger context window at 262K, compared with 128K for Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking.
Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking is ahead on BenchLM's provisional leaderboard, 59 to 56. The biggest single separator in this matchup is GPQA, where the scores are 57.6% and 84.2%.
Qwen3.5-35B-A3B has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 79.3 versus 57.6. Inside this category, GPQA is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.
Mellum2-12B-A2.5B-Thinking has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 69.9 versus 58.4. Qwen3.5-35B-A3B stays close enough that the answer can still flip depending on your workload.
Qwen3.5-35B-A3B has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 91.9 versus 76.5. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.
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