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Model comparison

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next vs Qwen 3.8 Max

Two Qwen tiers compared on the figures that decide which one a workload actually needs.

Catalog record checked September 26, 2026Individual provider fields may changeEvidence confidence: High — see receipts below

Qwen

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next

Budget · Open weights

vs

Qwen

Qwen 3.8 Max

Frontier · Open weights

AI model capability comparison
SpecificationQwen 3.8 Flash NextQwen 3.8 Max
ProviderQwenQwen
TierBudgetFrontier
Context window262KWinner: 1M
Max outputNot verifiedUnverified131K
Input / 1M tokensWinner: $0.15$2
Output / 1M tokensWinner: $0.47$6
WeightsOpenOpen
Parameters125B total / 6B active (MoE) + 51B n-gram embedding table2.4T total / 95B active (MoE)
Reasoning levelsNot verifiedUnverifiedlow, high, max
Modalitiestext, image, videotext, image, video
Licenseqwen-community-1.0Not disclosedUnverified
API model idqwen3.8-flashqwen3.8-max
ReleasedAugust 26, 2026August 3, 2026
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index (2026-09-26)39.8Winner: 45.4
Terminal-Bench 2.1 (2026-08-03)Not verifiedUnverified86.6
GPQA Diamond (2026-08-03)Not verifiedUnverified92.6
Humanity's Last Exam (2026-08-14)Not verifiedUnverified56.2
SWE-bench Verified (2026-09-01)Not verifiedUnverified85.6

Prices are USD per million tokens at standard rates, excluding batch and caching discounts. Bold indicates the better figure where one is objectively better. Values we could not confirm from the provider are shown as “Not verified” rather than estimated.

Benchmark receipts

Where each score comes from, and how far it can be compared across models.

Pricing tiers

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next: Hosted qwen3.8-flash lists $0.15/$0.47 per MTok on Alibaba Cloud Model Studio with a 1M context. The open checkpoint is 262,144 tokens native, extensible to 1M.

Qwen 3.8 Max: $2/$6 per MTok (Alibaba Cloud Model Studio). 1M context (up to 991K input), 131,072 max output. A dated snapshot qwen3.8-max-0902 is also listed; open weights shipped separately as Qwen3.8-2.4T-A95B.

BudgetOpen weightsRecord checked September 26, 2026

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next is Alibaba's experimental preview of the Qwen 4 architecture — very low active parameters plus an unusual n-gram embedding component for cheap long-context.

Best for

  • Early testing of Qwen 4 architecture
  • Cheap high-throughput work
  • Multimodal input

Watch out

Experimental preview; qwen-community-1.0 license is more restrictive than MIT/Apache; benchmark claims are vendor-reported.

FrontierOpen weightsRecord checked September 26, 2026

Qwen 3.8 Max

Qwen 3.8 Max is Alibaba's flagship — 2.4T MoE with 1M-class context, near frontier on the Intelligence Index.

Best for

  • Open-weight frontier work
  • Long-context
  • Multimodal

Watch out

Open weights dropped 2026-08-12 under a custom (non-Apache) licence with vision and 1M-context stripped from the open checkpoint — the open checkpoint is not the full API model. Verify the licence before commercial use.

When the cheaper one wins

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next is cheaper on output at $0.47 per million tokens against $6 for Qwen 3.8 Max — about 13×. Use the cheaper tier for classification, extraction, summarisation, and any task where the expensive model’s extra score does not change the accepted output. The expensive one only pays if your hardest task actually fails on the cheap tier. These are standard-tier API rates, excluding batch and cache discounts.

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Evidence confidence: High

How strong and complete the evidence behind this comparison is — not a prediction of which model is better.

  • Pricing verified on both sides — Input and output rates are verified for both models.
  • 3/5 core specs verified on both sides — Not published for at least one side: max output, reasoning levels.
  • 1 shared named benchmark with differing scores — Measured on: Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index.
  • Verified within the last 90 days — Newest catalog check was 2 days ago.
  • Both models carry source citations — Each side has at least two catalog sources on record.

Source receipts

Each catalog figure was checked against the provider or an independent second source on the date shown.

Related comparisons

Diving deeper on one model? Qwen 3.8 Flash Next · Qwen 3.8 Max

Common questions

Qwen 3.8 Flash Next vs Qwen 3.8 Max

Answered from the verified figures on this page rather than general guidance.

Is Qwen 3.8 Flash Next or Qwen 3.8 Max cheaper for input?
Qwen 3.8 Flash Next is cheaper at $0.15 per million input tokens, against $2 for Qwen 3.8 Max — roughly 13× the price. Output tokens usually dominate a real bill, so weigh the output rate more heavily than the input rate. These are base rates; Qwen 3.8 Flash Next has tiered pricing: Hosted qwen3.8-flash lists $0.15/$0.47 per MTok on Alibaba Cloud Model Studio with a 1M context. The open checkpoint is 262,144 tokens native, extensible to 1M. Qwen 3.8 Max has tiered pricing: $2/$6 per MTok (Alibaba Cloud Model Studio). 1M context (up to 991K input), 131,072 max output. A dated snapshot qwen3.8-max-0902 is also listed; open weights shipped separately as Qwen3.8-2.4T-A95B.
Is Qwen 3.8 Flash Next or Qwen 3.8 Max cheaper for output?
Qwen 3.8 Flash Next is cheaper at $0.47 per million output tokens, against $6 for Qwen 3.8 Max — roughly 13× the price. Output tokens usually dominate a real bill, so weigh the output rate more heavily than the input rate. These are base rates; Qwen 3.8 Flash Next has tiered pricing: Hosted qwen3.8-flash lists $0.15/$0.47 per MTok on Alibaba Cloud Model Studio with a 1M context. The open checkpoint is 262,144 tokens native, extensible to 1M. Qwen 3.8 Max has tiered pricing: $2/$6 per MTok (Alibaba Cloud Model Studio). 1M context (up to 991K input), 131,072 max output. A dated snapshot qwen3.8-max-0902 is also listed; open weights shipped separately as Qwen3.8-2.4T-A95B.
Which has the larger context window, Qwen 3.8 Flash Next or Qwen 3.8 Max?
Qwen 3.8 Max accepts 1M tokens against 262K for Qwen 3.8 Flash Next. This only matters if you routinely send very long documents or large codebases.
Should I use Qwen 3.8 Flash Next or Qwen 3.8 Max?
Qwen 3.8 Flash Next is the budget tier and Qwen 3.8 Max the frontier tier. The useful question is whether your hardest task actually fails on the cheaper one — most production volume such as classification, extraction and summarisation does not.

Next step

Choosing between them

The verified figures that separate this pair, computed from the catalog rather than restated boilerplate.

  • Input price: Qwen 3.8 Flash Next costs $0.15 per 1M tokens versus $2 for Qwen 3.8 Max — a 13.3x difference at the headline tier.
  • Context: Qwen 3.8 Max takes 1M against 262K for Qwen 3.8 Flash Next — only decisive if your prompts approach the smaller window.
  • Positioning: Qwen 3.8 Flash Next sits in the budget tier, Qwen 3.8 Max in the frontier tier — most production volume (classification, extraction, summarisation) does not need the pricier tier.
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