Grok 3-mini vs Qwen 2.5 72B: Pricing, Benchmarks & Verdict (2026)

Pricing verified Apr 8, 2026

⚡ Quick Answer

Compare Grok 3-mini and Qwen 2.5 72B across pricing, benchmarks, and capabilities.

Updated: April 8, 2026 · ✓ Pricing verified

Side-by-Side Comparison

FeatureGrok 3-miniQwen 2.5 72B
ProviderxAIAlibaba
Input Price / 1M tokens$0.200$0.400
Output Price / 1M tokens$0.800$1.20
Context Window
128K
128K
Max Output Tokens
4,096
4,096
Arena ELO
1,175
1,230
Coding ELO
1,190
1,210
TTFT (ms)
130
150
Tokens/sec
140
100
MultimodalNoNo
JSON ModeYesYes
Function CallingYesYes
VisionNoNo
When to Use Grok 3-mini

Grok 3-mini excels at cost-effective, general-purpose tasks.

Strengths:

  • Very cheap
  • Fast
  • Large context

Best for:

cost-effectivegeneral-purpose
When to Use Qwen 2.5 72B

Qwen 2.5 72B excels at coding, general-purpose tasks.

Strengths:

  • Strong code generation
  • Competitive pricing
  • Large context

Best for:

codinggeneral-purpose

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