# Granite 4.2 8B vs Qwen3.5-35B-A3B

> Side-by-side benchmark comparison for Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3.5-35B-A3B across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, multilingual, and math tasks.

- Canonical page: https://benchlm.ai/compare/granite-4-2-8b-vs-qwen3-5-35b-a3b
- Last updated: October 15, 2026

- Shared sourced benchmarks: 4
- HTML indexing: indexable
- Ranking lane: BenchAlign v5.8

## Quick Verdict

Qwen3.5-35B-A3B leads by point estimate. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence. Choose using the category evidence and your own workload tests.

## Summary

- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B has the higher overall point estimate 45.82 to 33.4. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence.
- The clearest category separation is in agentic, where the averages are 15.7 for Granite 4.2 8B and 33.4 for Qwen3.5-35B-A3B.
- The biggest single benchmark swing is SWE-bench Verified in Coding, with scores of 47.7% and 69.2%.
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B also has the larger context window at 262K.

## Model Snapshot

| Property | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B |
|----------|----------|----------|
| Creator | IBM | Alibaba |
| Type | Open Weight | Open Weight |
| Reasoning | Reasoning | Reasoning |
| Context | 128K | 262K |
| Overall Score | 33.4 | 45.82 |
| Benchmarks Covered | 14 | 20 |
| Pricing (input/output) | $0.00 / $0.00 | $0.00 / $0.00 |

## Category Breakdown

### Agentic

- Winner: Directional only
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 15.7 (Estimated · #113/127)
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 33.4 (Estimated · #84/127)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 20.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| τ³-bench results | 58.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| BFCL v4 | 52.4% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.0 | Coming soon | 40.5% | Coming soon |
| BrowseComp | Coming soon | 61% | Coming soon |
| OSWorld-Verified | Coming soon | 54.5% | Coming soon |
| Gert Labs | Coming soon | 28.96% | Coming soon |

### Coding

- Winner: Directional only
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 17.2 (Estimated · #125/150)
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 25.9 (Estimated · #105/150)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| SWE-bench Verified | 47.7% | 69.2% | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B |
| SWE-bench Pro | 19.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE Multilingual | 30.8% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 20.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| LiveCodeBench v6 | 73.2% | 74.6% | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B |
| SciCode | 36.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE-Rebench | Coming soon | 53.7% | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.0 | Coming soon | 40.5% | Coming soon |

### Reasoning

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 56.8 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 65.3 (Unranked · 3 rankable rows)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| LongBench v2 | Coming soon | 59% | Coming soon |

### Multimodal & Grounded

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: Coming soon
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 64.6 (#42/54)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| MMMU | Coming soon | 81.4% | Coming soon |
| MMVU | Coming soon | 72.3% | Coming soon |
| MMMU-Pro | Coming soon | 75.1% | Coming soon |
| CharXiv | Coming soon | 77.5% | Coming soon |
| MathVision | Coming soon | 83.9% | Coming soon |
| V* | Coming soon | 92.7% | Coming soon |

### Knowledge

- Winner: Qwen3.5-35B-A3B
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 30.6 (Supported · #154/184)
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 43.2 (Supported · #106/184)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| GPQA | 64.1% | 84.2% | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B |
| MMLU-Pro | 74.0% | 85.3% | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B |
| SuperGPQA | Coming soon | 63.4% | Coming soon |

### Multilingual

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: Coming soon
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 83.8 (#11/17)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| MMLU-ProX | Coming soon | 81% | Coming soon |

### Instruction Following

- Winner: Directional only
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: 86.5 (#41/146)
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: 88.8 (#32/146)

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| IFBench | 79.3% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| IFEval | Coming soon | 91.9% | Coming soon |

### Mathematics

- Winner: Not comparable
- Granite 4.2 8B public-lane score: Coming soon
- Qwen3.5-35B-A3B public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 8B | Qwen3.5-35B-A3B | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| AIME 2025 | 86.7% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| HMMT Feb 2025 | 78.3% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

## FAQ

### Which is better overall, Granite 4.2 8B or Qwen3.5-35B-A3B?

Qwen3.5-35B-A3B has the higher overall point estimate. Conditional score ranges do not establish rank confidence.

### Where is the biggest gap between Granite 4.2 8B and Qwen3.5-35B-A3B?

The widest category gap is in agentic, where the averages are 15.7 for Granite 4.2 8B and 33.4 for Qwen3.5-35B-A3B.

### How many benchmarks does Granite 4.2 8B cover on BenchLM?

Granite 4.2 8B currently has 14 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

### How many benchmarks does Qwen3.5-35B-A3B cover on BenchLM?

Qwen3.5-35B-A3B currently has 20 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

## Related Comparisons

- [Granite 4.2 8B vs Granite 4.2 30B](/compare/granite-4-2-30b-vs-granite-4-2-8b)
- [Qwen3.5-35B-A3B vs Granite 4.2 30B](/compare/granite-4-2-30b-vs-qwen3-5-35b-a3b)
- [Granite 4.2 8B vs Granite 4.2 3B](/compare/granite-4-2-3b-vs-granite-4-2-8b)
- [Qwen3.5-35B-A3B vs Granite 4.2 3B](/compare/granite-4-2-3b-vs-qwen3-5-35b-a3b)

## Explore More

- [Granite 4.2 8B profile](/models/granite-4-2-8b)
- [Qwen3.5-35B-A3B profile](/models/qwen3-5-35b-a3b)
- [Compare Pricing](/llm-pricing)
- [Alternative Finder](/tools/alternative-finder)
- [LLM Selector](/tools/llm-selector)
- [Overall Rankings](/best/overall)