Compare / Qwen3-Max vs Kimi K2.6

Qwen3-Max vs Kimi K2.6

Which is cheaper, which is more capable, and which does better at each kind of work, from 18 results on 5 sources that measured both models.

AlibabaQwen3-Max Released 24 Sep 2025 · $0.78 in · $3.90 out
Moonshot AIKimi K2.6 Released 20 Apr 2026 · $0.95 in · $4.00 out
Qwen3-Max wins 1Kimi K2.6 wins 17

Of the 18 results both models have, the better value on each. Results whose reported ranges overlap are too close to call.

Results as of 13 October 2026 (catalogue release 2026-10-13-2e2420e3c5cc). See also Alibaba vs Moonshot AI, every model from both labs.

Qwen3-Max or Kimi K2.6? The short answer

Pick Kimi K2.6: it scores higher (Intelligence Index 27.0 against 15.6) at about the same price.

  • They cost about the same: $1.56 and $1.71 per million tokens (three input to one output).
  • Kimi K2.6 scores higher on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index: 27.0 against 15.6.
  • Kimi K2.6 is newer: released 20 Apr 2026, against 24 Sep 2025 for Qwen3-Max.
  • On third-party benchmarks, on the results both models have: Qwen3-Max does better for sticking to the facts; Kimi K2.6 for agents and tool use, reasoning and knowledge and writing.

Head to head

15.6
Intelligence Index
27.0
$1.56
Price per million tokens, blendedlower is better
$1.71
262,144
Context window, tokens
262,144

Every fact side by side

Qwen3-MaxKimi K2.6
Price per million tokens$0.78 in · $3.90 out$0.95 in · $4.00 out
Blended (3 in : 1 out)$1.56$1.71
Cheapest host, blended–$0.96 (Inceptron, INT4)
Cached input, per million–$0.16 cached input
Intelligence Index15.627.0
Spring Prompt overall––
Output speed, tokens a second––
Context window262,144 tokens262,144 tokens
Released24 Sep 202520 Apr 2026 (newer)
WeightsClosedOpen
Developer based inChinaChina

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 154 of 164 65 of 164
Professional workReal tasks from banking, consulting and law, business documents and freelance projects not measured 43 of 51
Reasoning and knowledgeHard questions across science, maths and general knowledge 121 of 198 50 of 198
WritingWhat people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality 99 of 188 35 of 188
Sticking to the factsSummarising without inventing things, and factual answers 50 of 152 84 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-MaxKimi K2.6
Arena (formerly LMArena) reported by Arena (formerly LMArena) · 3 results
Overall · TextArena rating, higher is better 108 · 50 of 387 measured 1,423 1,461
Business, management and finance · TextArena rating, higher is better 110 · 59 of 380 measured 1,419 1,455
Creative writing · TextArena rating, higher is better 105 · 58 of 385 measured 1,393 1,433
Artificial Analysis reported by Artificial Analysis · 3 results
Artificial Analysis Intelligence Indexindex score, higher is better 123 · 62 of 243 measured 15.6 27.0
GPQA Diamond% of questions, higher is better 132 · 31 of 231 measured 76.4% 91.1%
Humanity's Last Exam% of questions, higher is better 140 · 51 of 242 measured 11.9% 37.5%
SimpleQA Verified (Epoch AI) reported by SimpleQA Verified (Epoch AI) · 1 result
Correct answers% of questions, higher is better 27 · 49 of 76 measured 48.7% 34.9%
UGI Leaderboard reported by UGI Leaderboard · 3 results
Writing score · UGIscore out of 100, higher is better 115 · 30 of 230 measured 38.6 64.4thinking reasoning
Requested-length error · UGI% off the requested word count, lower is better 134 · 91 of 230 measured 23.0% 18.0%thinking reasoning
Style adherence · UGIscore from 0 to 1, higher is better 155 · 108 of 230 measured 0.33 0.35thinking reasoning
Vending-Bench 2 reported by Vending-Bench 2 · 1 result
Money after a yearUS dollars, higher is better 52 · 15 of 58 measured $71.57 $6,205
Show all 18 results (7 more)
MeasureQwen3-MaxKimi K2.6
Arena (formerly LMArena) reported by Arena (formerly LMArena) · 3 results
Expert prompts · TextArena rating, higher is better 137 · 32 of 338 measured 1,417 1,503
Instruction following · TextArena rating, higher is better 106 · 47 of 387 measured 1,413 1,456
Writing, literature and language · TextArena rating, higher is better 101 · 58 of 386 measured 1,405 1,441
Artificial Analysis reported by Artificial Analysis · 4 results
IFBench% of instructions, higher is better 118 · 18 of 195 measured 44.2% 76.0%
Long-context reasoning (AA-LCR)% of questions, higher is better 154 · 31 of 233 measured 50.0% 81.0%
Terminal-Bench Hard% of tasks, higher is better 91 · 23 of 190 measured 20.5% 43.9%
τ²-bench telecom% of tasks, higher is better 79 · 12 of 193 measured 74.3% 95.9%

Quick answers

Is Qwen3-Max better than Kimi K2.6?

Pick Kimi K2.6: it scores higher (Intelligence Index 27.0 against 15.6) at about the same price.

Which is cheaper, Qwen3-Max or Kimi K2.6?

They cost about the same: $1.56 and $1.71 per million tokens (three input to one output).

Which is better for agents and tool use, Qwen3-Max or Kimi K2.6?

Kimi K2.6 ranks 65 of 164 models on sale for multi-step tasks with tools: support desks, coding agents, function calls, against 154 for Qwen3-Max.

Which is better for reasoning and knowledge, Qwen3-Max or Kimi K2.6?

Kimi K2.6 ranks 50 of 198 models on sale for hard questions across science, maths and general knowledge, against 121 for Qwen3-Max.

Which is better for writing, Qwen3-Max or Kimi K2.6?

Kimi K2.6 ranks 35 of 188 models on sale for what people prefer in blind comparisons, and judged writing quality, against 99 for Qwen3-Max.

Which is better for sticking to the facts, Qwen3-Max or Kimi K2.6?

Qwen3-Max ranks 50 of 152 models on sale for summarising without inventing things, and factual answers, against 84 for Kimi K2.6.

Run Qwen3-Max and Kimi K2.6 on your own prompt

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