Compare / Qwen3 235B A22B vs R1
Qwen3 235B A22B vs R1
Which is cheaper, which is more capable, and which does better at each kind of work, from 15 results on 3 sources that measured both models.
Qwen3 235B A22B or R1? The short answer
- Qwen3 235B A22B is cheaper: $0.80 against $1.15 per million tokens, 31% less.
- R1 scores higher on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index: 11.4 against 9.5.
- On our business benchmarks, Qwen3 235B A22B ranks higher for sticking to the facts.
- On our business benchmarks, R1 ranks higher for reasoning and knowledge and writing.
At a glance
| Qwen3 235B A22B | R1 | |
|---|---|---|
| Price per million tokens | $0.46 in · $1.82 out | $0.70 in · $2.50 out |
| Blended (3 in : 1 out) | $0.80 | $1.15 |
| Cheapest host, blended | – | – |
| Intelligence Index | 9.5 | 11.4 |
| Spring Prompt overall | – | – |
| Output speed, tokens a second | – | – |
| Context window | 131,072 tokens | 64,000 tokens |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Developer based in | China | China |
Prices are the developer's list price where we have read it, otherwise the typical host on OpenRouter; see every model's price. Intelligence and speed from Artificial Analysis.
Which is better for what
Each model's rank among models available today, for each kind of work, from our own benchmarks and licensed sources. The better rank is in green.
| Use case | Qwen3 235B A22B | R1 |
|---|---|---|
| Agents and tool useMulti-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls | not measured | 123 of 161 |
| Reasoning and knowledgeHard questions across science, maths and general knowledge | 137 of 195 | 133 of 195 |
| WritingWhat people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality | 102 of 187 | 89 of 187 |
| Sticking to the factsSummarising without inventing things, and factual answers | 64 of 153 | 110 of 153 |
Every shared result
| Benchmark | Metric | Qwen3 235B A22B | R1 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Arena (formerly LMArena)reported | Business, management and financeArena rating | 1,414 | 1,388 |
| Arena (formerly LMArena)reported | Creative writingArena rating | 1,366 | 1,374 |
| Arena (formerly LMArena)reported | Expert promptsArena rating | 1,395 | 1,402 |
| Arena (formerly LMArena)reported | Instruction followingArena rating | 1,381 | 1,397 |
| Arena (formerly LMArena)reported | OverallArena rating | 1,403 | 1,398 |
| Arena (formerly LMArena)reported | Writing, literature and languageArena rating | 1,378 | 1,382 |
| Artificial Analysisreported | Artificial Analysis Intelligence Indexindex score | 9.50 | 11.4 |
| Artificial Analysisreported | GPQA Diamond% of questions | 70.0% | 70.8% |
| Artificial Analysisreported | Humanity's Last Exam% of questions | 11.0% | 8.5% |
| Artificial Analysisreported | IFBench% of instructions | 38.7% | 39.0% |
| Artificial Analysisreported | Long-context reasoning (AA-LCR)% of questions | 0.0% | 57.7% |
| Artificial Analysisreported | Terminal-Bench Hard% of tasks | 6.1% | 6.1% |
| Artificial Analysisreported | Τ²-bench telecom% of tasks | 27.2% | 11.4% |
| Vectara Hallucination Leaderboardreported | Answer rate% of documents | 94.9% | 97.0% |
| Vectara Hallucination Leaderboardreported | Hallucination rate% of summaries | 9.3% | 11.3% |
Bold green marks the better value on that metric. Where a source reports ranges that overlap, the difference may not be meaningful; see the benchmark page for ranges.
Quick answers
Is Qwen3 235B A22B better than R1?
It depends on the task. Among models available today, on our benchmarks and licensed sources, Qwen3 235B A22B ranks higher for sticking to the facts; R1 ranks higher for reasoning and knowledge and writing.
Which is cheaper, Qwen3 235B A22B or R1?
Qwen3 235B A22B costs $0.80 per million tokens (three input to one output), against $1.15 for R1.
Run Qwen3 235B A22B and R1 on your own prompt
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