Compare / Qwen3-8B vs Gemma 3 4B

Qwen3-8B vs Gemma 3 4B

Which is cheaper, which is more capable, and which does better at each kind of work, from 23 results on 4 sources that measured both models.

AlibabaQwen3-8B Released 28 Apr 2025 · $0.12 in · $0.46 out
GoogleGemma 3 4B Released 11 Mar 2025 · $0.050 in · $0.10 out
Qwen3-8B wins 19Gemma 3 4B wins 4

Of the 23 results both models have, the better value on each. Results whose reported ranges overlap are too close to call.

Results as of 9 October 2026 (catalogue release 2026-10-09-dd620e778ac5). See also Alibaba vs Google, every model from both labs.

Qwen3-8B or Gemma 3 4B? The short answer

Pick Qwen3-8B if quality matters most: it scores higher (Intelligence Index 7.3 against 4.8). Pick Gemma 3 4B if cost matters more: it costs 3.2 times less per token.

  • Gemma 3 4B is cheaper: $0.062 against $0.20 per million tokens, 3.2 times less.
  • Qwen3-8B scores higher on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index: 7.3 against 4.8.
  • Qwen3-8B is newer: released 28 Apr 2025, against 11 Mar 2025 for Gemma 3 4B.
  • On third-party benchmarks, on the results both models have: Qwen3-8B does better for agents and tool use, reasoning and knowledge, writing and sticking to the facts.

Head to head

7.3
Intelligence Index
4.8
$0.20
Price per million tokens, blendedlower is better
$0.062
131,072
Context window, tokens
131,072

Every fact side by side

Qwen3-8BGemma 3 4B
Price per million tokens$0.12 in · $0.46 out$0.050 in · $0.10 out
Blended (3 in : 1 out)$0.20$0.062
Cheapest host, blended––
Intelligence Index7.34.8
Spring Prompt overall––
Output speed, tokens a second––
Context window131,072 tokens131,072 tokens
Released28 Apr 2025 (newer)11 Mar 2025
WeightsOpenOpen
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 128 of 164 163 of 164
Reasoning and knowledgeHard questions across science, maths and general knowledge 169 of 198 190 of 198
WritingWhat people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality 159 of 188 172 of 188
Sticking to the factsSummarising without inventing things, and factual answers 6 of 152 33 of 152

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.

MeasureQwen3-8BGemma 3 4B
Artificial Analysis reported by Artificial Analysis · 3 results
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Indexindex score, higher is better 211 · 240 of 243 measured 7.3thinking reasoning 4.8
GPQA Diamond% of questions, higher is better 183 · 226 of 231 measured 58.9%thinking reasoning 29.1%
Humanity's Last Exam% of questions, higher is better 220 · 186 of 242 measured 3.9%thinking reasoning 5.3%
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) V4 reported by Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) V4 · 3 results
Overall accuracy · BFCL% correct, higher is better 30 · 74 of 81 measured 42.6%bfcl fc 19.6%bfcl prompt
Irrelevance detection · BFCL% correct, higher is better 38 · 71 of 81 measured 82.3%bfcl prompt 53.9%bfcl prompt
Memory · BFCL% correct, higher is better 40 · 53 of 81 measured 14.6%bfcl fc 8.6%bfcl prompt
UGI Leaderboard reported by UGI Leaderboard · 3 results
Writing score · UGIscore out of 100, higher is better 162 · 185 of 230 measured 28.0no reasoning 24.0
Requested-length error · UGI% off the requested word count, lower is better 83 · 33 of 230 measured 17.0%no reasoning 9.0%
Style adherence · UGIscore from 0 to 1, higher is better 60 · 214 of 230 measured 0.36no reasoning 0.29
Vectara Hallucination Leaderboard reported by Vectara Hallucination Leaderboard · 2 results
Hallucination rate · Vectara% of summaries, lower is better 9 · 28 of 104 measured 4.8% 6.4%
Answer rate · Vectara% of documents, higher is better 17 · 103 of 104 measured 99.9% 67.3%
Show all 23 results (12 more)
MeasureQwen3-8BGemma 3 4B
Artificial Analysis reported by Artificial Analysis · 7 results
Terminal-Bench 2.1% of tasks, higher is better 122 · 126 of 130 measured 2.2%thinking reasoning 0.4%
τ-bench banking% of tasks, higher is better 109 · 121 of 121 measured 4.7%thinking reasoning 0.4%
Artificial Analysis Coding Indexindex score, higher is better 123 · 130 of 131 measured 9.0thinking reasoning 2.7
IFBench% of instructions, higher is better 165 · 187 of 195 measured 33.5%thinking reasoning 28.3%
Long-context reasoning (AA-LCR)% of questions, higher is better 222 · 218 of 233 measured 0.0%no reasoning 6.7%
Terminal-Bench Hard% of tasks, higher is better 173 · 180 of 190 measured 2.3%no reasoning 0.8%
τ²-bench telecom% of tasks, higher is better 142 · 187 of 193 measured 27.8%thinking reasoning 5.0%
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) V4 reported by Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) V4 · 5 results
Multi-turn tasks · BFCL% correct, higher is better 23 · 75 of 81 measured 41.8%bfcl fc 0.4%bfcl prompt
Relevance detection · BFCL% correct, higher is better 8 · 1 of 81 measured 93.8%bfcl fc 100.0%bfcl prompt
Single-turn calls (curated) · BFCL% correct, higher is better 14 · 74 of 81 measured 88.6%bfcl prompt 61.1%bfcl prompt
Single-turn calls (user-contributed) · BFCL% correct, higher is better 9 · 64 of 81 measured 80.5%bfcl fc 60.8%bfcl prompt
Web search · BFCL% correct, higher is better 35 · 56 of 81 measured 13.5%bfcl prompt 1.0%bfcl prompt

Quick answers

Is Qwen3-8B better than Gemma 3 4B?

Pick Qwen3-8B if quality matters most: it scores higher (Intelligence Index 7.3 against 4.8). Pick Gemma 3 4B if cost matters more: it costs 3.2 times less per token.

Which is cheaper, Qwen3-8B or Gemma 3 4B?

Gemma 3 4B is cheaper: $0.062 against $0.20 per million tokens, 3.2 times less.

Which is better for agents and tool use, Qwen3-8B or Gemma 3 4B?

Qwen3-8B ranks 128 of 164 models on sale for multi-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls, against 163 for Gemma 3 4B.

Which is better for reasoning and knowledge, Qwen3-8B or Gemma 3 4B?

Qwen3-8B ranks 169 of 198 models on sale for hard questions across science, maths and general knowledge, against 190 for Gemma 3 4B.

Which is better for writing, Qwen3-8B or Gemma 3 4B?

Qwen3-8B ranks 159 of 188 models on sale for what people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality, against 172 for Gemma 3 4B.

Which is better for sticking to the facts, Qwen3-8B or Gemma 3 4B?

Qwen3-8B ranks 6 of 152 models on sale for summarising without inventing things, and factual answers, against 33 for Gemma 3 4B.

Run Qwen3-8B and Gemma 3 4B on your own prompt

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