Compare / Qwen3.6-Plus vs Claude 3 Opus

Qwen3.6-Plus vs Claude 3 Opus

Which is cheaper, which is more capable, and which does better at each kind of work, from 10 results on 3 sources that measured both models.

AlibabaQwen3.6-Plus Released 31 Mar 2026 · $0.33 in · $1.95 out
AnthropicClaude 3 Opus Released 4 Mar 2024 · Not on sale
Qwen3.6-Plus wins 10Claude 3 Opus wins 0

Of the 10 results both models have, the better value on each. Results whose reported ranges overlap are too close to call.

Results as of 14 October 2026 (catalogue release 2026-10-14-7d7cf32c3f6d). See also Alibaba vs Anthropic, every model from both labs.

Qwen3.6-Plus or Claude 3 Opus? The short answer

They score and cost about the same: pick on the results below that match your work.

  • Qwen3.6-Plus is newer: released 31 Mar 2026, against 4 Mar 2024 for Claude 3 Opus.
  • On third-party benchmarks, on the results both models have: Qwen3.6-Plus does better for writing and sticking to the facts.

Head to head

Every fact side by side

Qwen3.6-PlusClaude 3 Opus
Price per million tokens$0.33 in · $1.95 outNot on sale
Blended (3 in : 1 out)$0.73–
Cheapest host, blended––
Intelligence Index27.0–
Spring Prompt overall––
Output speed, tokens a second––
Context window1,000,000 tokens–
Released31 Mar 2026 (newer)4 Mar 2024
WeightsClosedClosed
Developer based inChinathe US

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 the models on sale today, for each kind of work, from our own benchmarks and licensed sources. Further right is better; the better rank is in green.

Agents and tool useMulti-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls 64 of 166 not measured
Reasoning and knowledgeHard questions across science, maths and general knowledge 69 of 200 not measured
WritingWhat people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality 55 of 189 113 of 190
Sticking to the factsSummarising without inventing things, and factual answers 81 of 153 145 of 154

Every shared result

Each model's best result on every measure both have, grouped by benchmark, with the setting that produced it. Under each measure, every model that benchmark has measured is a grey tick, best to the right, so you can see where the two sit in the field. The headline measures of each benchmark come first; the rest are under "Show all". Green marks the better value; where a source reports ranges that overlap, neither is marked.

MeasureQwen3.6-PlusClaude 3 Opus
Arena (formerly LMArena) reported by Arena (formerly LMArena) · 3 results
Overall · TextArena rating, higher is better 76 · 229 of 387 measured 1,443 1,322
Business, management and finance · TextArena rating, higher is better 75 · 239 of 380 measured 1,446 1,305
Creative writing · TextArena rating, higher is better 82 · 224 of 385 measured 1,407 1,288
SimpleQA Verified (Epoch AI) reported by SimpleQA Verified (Epoch AI) · 1 result
Correct answers% of questions, higher is better 38 · 71 of 76 measured 44.1% 12.6%
UGI Leaderboard reported by UGI Leaderboard · 3 results
Writing score · UGIscore out of 100, higher is better 49 · 62 of 230 measured 58.2thinking reasoning 54.3
Requested-length error · UGI% off the requested word count, lower is better 25 · 111 of 230 measured 8.0%thinking reasoning 20.0%
Style adherence · UGIscore from 0 to 1, higher is better 96 · 113 of 230 measured 0.35no reasoning 0.35
Show all 10 results (3 more)
MeasureQwen3.6-PlusClaude 3 Opus
Arena (formerly LMArena) reported by Arena (formerly LMArena) · 3 results
Expert prompts · TextArena rating, higher is better 68 · 217 of 338 measured 1,476 1,318
Instruction following · TextArena rating, higher is better 74 · 217 of 387 measured 1,435 1,314
Writing, literature and language · TextArena rating, higher is better 76 · 202 of 386 measured 1,423 1,316

Quick answers

Is Qwen3.6-Plus better than Claude 3 Opus?

They score and cost about the same: pick on the results below that match your work.

Which is better for writing, Qwen3.6-Plus or Claude 3 Opus?

Qwen3.6-Plus ranks 55 of 189 models on sale for what people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality, against 113 for Claude 3 Opus.

Which is better for sticking to the facts, Qwen3.6-Plus or Claude 3 Opus?

Qwen3.6-Plus ranks 81 of 153 models on sale for summarising without inventing things, and factual answers, against 145 for Claude 3 Opus.

Run Qwen3.6-Plus and Claude 3 Opus on your own prompt

Benchmarks aren't your data. Try both side by side in the playground, with the cost of every answer.