Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct vs Qwen3.5 397B A17B
Updated October 21, 2026. 26 benchmarks have a result for both. Coding is ranked on the Vibe Coding Index; every other board is shown as published.
Decision reading
Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct and Qwen3.5 397B A17B are level for coding, 30.5 against 28.6 on the Vibe Coding Index, so price and context decide.
Pick Qwen3.5 397B A17B when the context window is larger, 262K against 33K tokens, or when what matters is LMArena Text: coding or LMArena Text: software and IT, where it leads. Pick Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct when output tokens cost 2.3x less.
- Shared results
- 26
- Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct only
- 9
- Qwen3.5 397B A17B only
- 39
- Like-for-like categories
- 6 of 9
Shared results can support a head-to-head reading. Results only one model has describe coverage, not superiority.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, four public coding benchmarks
No call
Level: 30.5 against 28.6, inside 2 points.
2 and 1 benchmarks behind the scores
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
Qwen3.5 397B A17B
Qwen3.5 397B A17B leads, 21.4 against 6.7.
Same board, both measured
Web design
Design Arena: websites
No call
Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B has a Design Arena: websites result, 1191.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Qwen3.5 397B A17B
Qwen3.5 397B A17B takes 262K tokens against 33K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct
Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct $0.0012, Qwen3.5 397B A17B $0.0016 per turn.
List prices
At a glance
- Coding index
- Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct 30.5 from 2 benchmarks, Qwen3.5 397B A17B 28.6 from 1 benchmark.
- Widest category
- Knowledge, 37.5 points apart on average over 4 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run): Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct 41.7% against Qwen3.5 397B A17B 89.3%, 47.6 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct $1.00 against Qwen3.5 397B A17B $2.34 per million output tokens, 2.3x apart.
- Context window
- Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct takes 33K tokens, Qwen3.5 397B A17B 262K.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Bars | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 0 | 2 | ||
| Intelligence | 0 | 2 | ||
| Reasoning | 0 | 5 | ||
| Math | 0 | 2 | ||
| Knowledge | 0 | 4 | ||
| General | 0 | 11 | ||
| All shared boards | 0 | 26 |
CodingLike-for-likeFour of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index02
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aider polyglot | 16.4% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| SWE-bench Verified | 47.0% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| LMArena WebDev | Not measured | 1400 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | 29.5% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| SciCode | Not measured | 44.8% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 40.9% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| ALE-Bench | Not measured | 621.9 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1276 | 1464 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1261 | 1463 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena WebDev: React | Not measured | 1388 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | Not measured | 1410 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 27 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index02
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 6.7 | 21.4 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 119.5 | 146.8 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index2 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| τ²-Bench Telecom | Not measured | 95.6% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| APEX-Agents | Not measured | 24.9% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 37 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index05
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 41.7% | 89.3% | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 3.5% | 29.0% | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | Not measured | 86.4% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | Not measured | 18.0% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1251 | 1448 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1221 | 1462 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1269 | 1450 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Vision: diagrams | Not measured | 1277 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: homework | Not measured | 1292 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 12 boards here | |||
MathLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index02
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME | Not measured | 88.9% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | Not measured | 31.2% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| GSM8K | 93.0% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1251 | 1453 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1243 | 1454 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| Neither model has a result on the other 8 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index04
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | 63.5% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| MMLU | 79.1% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| AI2 Reasoning Challenge | 70.5% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1221 | 1457 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1187 | 1455 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1257 | 1441 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1224 | 1435 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| Neither model has a result on the other 10 boards here | |||
Web designDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index7 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | Not measured | 1191 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Design Arena: UI components | Not measured | 1163 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Design Arena: game dev | Not measured | 1141 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Design Arena: data viz | Not measured | 1175 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Design Arena: 3D | Not measured | 1161 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Design Arena: all code categories | Not measured | 1180 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Design Arena: SVG | Not measured | 1139 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 2 boards here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index011
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| IFBench | Not measured | 78.8% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | Not measured | 77.3% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| DTBench | Not measured | 87.5% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMCA | Not measured | 37.9% | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| HellaSwag | 83.0% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| WinoGrande | 80.8% | Not measured | Only Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct measured |
| LMArena Text | 1230 | 1437 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1223 | 1424 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1174 | 1402 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Vision | Not measured | 1262 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: English | 1248 | 1443 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1205 | 1430 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1222 | 1498 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: German | Not measured | 1445 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | Not measured | 1429 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | Not measured | 1384 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: French | Not measured | 1462 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | Not measured | 1441 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1228 | 1430 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: Polish | Not measured | 1447 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1222 | 1446 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1251 | 1441 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1191 | 1415 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1150 | 1399 | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
| LMArena Vision: English | Not measured | 1268 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: Chinese | Not measured | 1314 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: reading text | Not measured | 1271 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: humor | Not measured | 1262 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: captioning | Not measured | 1230 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: recognizing things | Not measured | 1265 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| LMArena Vision: creative writing | Not measured | 1260 | Only Qwen3.5 397B A17B measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 15 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Qwen3.5 397B A17B costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Qwen3.5 397B A17B costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct | Qwen3.5 397B A17B |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Qwen | Qwen |
| Weights | Open weights | Open weights |
| Released | November 11, 2024 | February 16, 2026 |
| Context window | 33K | 262K |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.66 | $0.39 |
| Output $/Mtok | $1.00 | $2.34 |
| Coding index | 30.5 | 28.6 |
| Independent measurements behind it | 2 | 1 |
| Cost per solved task | Not computable | Not computable |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct better than Qwen3.5 397B A17B for coding?
Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct and Qwen3.5 397B A17B are level for coding, 30.5 against 28.6 on the Vibe Coding Index, so price and context decide. Pick Qwen3.5 397B A17B when the context window is larger, 262K against 33K tokens, or when what matters is LMArena Text: coding or LMArena Text: software and IT, where it leads. Pick Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct when output tokens cost 2.3x less.
Which is cheaper, Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct or Qwen3.5 397B A17B?
Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct costs $0.66 per million input tokens and $1.00 per million output tokens; Qwen3.5 397B A17B costs $0.39 and $2.34. Cost per solved task is known for neither of them.
Which has the bigger context window, Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct or Qwen3.5 397B A17B?
Qwen3.5 397B A17B, with 262K tokens against 33K.
How many benchmarks is the Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct vs Qwen3.5 397B A17B comparison based on?
26 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 21, 2026. Qwen2.5 Coder 32B Instruct's coding index rests on 2 independent benchmarks and Qwen3.5 397B A17B's on 1. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.