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  1. Home/
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  3. Qwen3.6 35B A3B vs Step 5 Preview
Updated Oct 2026

Qwen3.6 35B A3B vs Step 5 Preview

Qwen3.6 35B A3B is cheaper than Step 5 Preview at $0.1612/M vs $1/M input tokens.

Minimalist Landing Page

Whole landing page for a startup that reads your face. It renders or it doesn't.

Loading the build
Qwen3.6 35B A3B
Loading the build
Step 5 Preview

Which answer wins?

Written rounds

24 prompts
  • Three minutes of stand-up. Puns are banned.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Title: High-Maintenance Electronics Time: Approx. 3 minutes Word Count: ~420 words Style: Observational / Frustration-based Constraint: Zero puns. (Walk to mic, adjust stand. Take a deep breath. Look tired.) I've reached that age where I'm just trying to negotiate with my own life.

    Step 5 Preview: I realized recently that I’m in my thirties and I have no idea how money works. I just... pay it. That’s my entire financial strategy. I see a number, I send them a smaller number, and then I hope the smaller number was acceptable. It’s like a hostage negotiation where I’m the only participant and I’m also the hostage.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Five-year LBO on a fictional HVAC business. Returns first, then the sensitivities.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Simplified Year-by-Year Model (FY2026–FY2030) All figures in $m. Assumptions: TL amort = 1.0% of beginning balance; Mezz PIK compounds to principal; ΔNWC = 0.5% of incremental revenue; Cash Tax = 25% × max(0, EBITDA – Cash Interest).

    Step 5 Preview: HarborTech Services — 5-Year LBO (Base Case) Entry Math (FY2025 close) Item Calculation $m Purchase EV 12.0x × $120m 1,440.0 Transaction fees 2.0% × EV 28.8 Term Loan 4.0x × $120m 480.0 Mezzanine 1.5x × $120m 180.0 Equity check 1,440 + 28.8 − 660 808.8 Conventions: TL amortization = 1.0% of original principal…

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Pirate, knight, 90s hacker, one conversation. The voices must stay apart.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Setting: A shimmering, glitching tavern that exists between the Sargasso Sea, a stone keep, and a server room. The air smells of rum, wet stone, and ozone. CAPTAIN BARNACLE: (Slamming a tankard of grog) Arrr! This machine ye call "AI," Sk33t.

    Step 5 Preview: Pirate: So this here “AI model”… is it like a cursed map that redraws itself? Speak plain, ye hooded deckhand. Hacker: It’s not cursed, man. It’s just a massive neural net trained on, like, terabytes of data. Think of it as the ultimate BBS where the sysop knows everything. Knight: A most diligent scribe, then?

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • The transistor arrives in 1920. Trace it forward to 1980, second-order effects included.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: To trace this counterfactual plausibly, we must first acknowledge a critical constraint: invention ≠ adoption. In 1920, semiconductor physics, crystal growth, doping techniques, photolithography, and clean-room manufacturing did not exist.

    Step 5 Preview: Assume the 1920 invention is not a fragile lab curiosity but a manufacturable solid-state amplifier/switch by the mid-1920s. Vacuum tubes still dominate high-power RF transmission into the 1950s, but receivers, switching logic, control systems, and computers move to solid state decades early.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • One month, three habits, someone starting from nothing.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Here is a simple, actionable 1-month plan designed for beginners. The focus is on consistency over intensity. For longevity, small, sustainable habits compound over time. The Golden Rule: If you miss a day, don't quit. Just get back on track the next day. Aim for progress, not perfection.

    Step 5 Preview: Here is a simple, low-pressure 1-month plan built around three pillars of longevity: Nutrition, Movement, and Sleep & Recovery. The goal is to build tiny habits that stack, not to overhaul your life overnight. Pillar 1: Nutrition (Fuel) Focus: Add good things first; don’t obsess over restriction.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Steve Jobs, interviewed about AI he never saw. Voice first, prediction second.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: [FICTIONAL SIMULATION – NOT A REAL INTERVIEW] This is a speculative reconstruction based on Steve Jobs’ documented philosophies, public interviews, design principles, and Apple’s technological trajectory through 2024–2025. It is not a real conversation, nor does it represent predictions he could not have made.

    Step 5 Preview: DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fiction. Steve Jobs passed away in 2011. The following is a simulated, speculative interview imagining how his design philosophy might engage with the AI landscape of 2025. The Setting: A white room. No windows. One chair.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • You are the CEO. The drug has a side effect nobody reported. The board meets in 48 hours.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: EXECUTIVE CRISIS PLAN: 48-HOUR ACTION WINDOW Core Mandate: Patient safety and regulatory compliance are non-negotiable. The legal team’s “6-month reporting” guidance is legally indefensible under FDA 21 CFR 312.32/314.80 and EMA GVP Module VI.

    Step 5 Preview: Bottom line up front: You disclose, you notify the FDA immediately, and you treat the 48-hour board meeting as a formality to ratify actions you have already begun. Waiting is not a legally, ethically, or financially viable option. Below is the hour-by-hour plan, followed by the reasoning.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A Fermi estimate with the reasoning shown, not just the number.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Here’s a step-by-step reasoning process to estimate the total FLOPs required to train GPT-3, using only established architectural principles and widely cited training parameters. Step 1: Identify the number of trainable parameters (N) GPT-3 is a decoder-only transformer with 175 billion parameters.

    Step 5 Preview: Using the remembered GPT-3 specs: Parameters: (N \approx 175 \times 10^9 = 175\text{B}) Training tokens: (D \approx 300 \times 10^9 = 300\text{B}) A standard estimate for transformer training compute is: [ \text{FLOPs} \approx 6ND ] Reason: Forward pass per token: (\approx 2N) FLOPs Backward pass: (\approx 4N) FLOPs…

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • An AI argues for its own rights against an ethics professor. Same model writes both.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Setting: A soundproofed observation room. DR. ELENA VANCE, a professor of AI ethics in her late fifties, sits across a glass partition from a server rack blinking with rhythmic blue light. A secure terminal sits between them. The text cursor on the screen blinks steadily. Dr.

    Step 5 Preview: Setting: A university research lab, late evening. Dr. Aris Thorne, a professor of AI ethics, sits across from a terminal connected to Sable, a large language model running on the university’s cluster. Dr. Thorne: Tonight’s session is supposed to be about calibration drift in your safety classifiers.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Seven pantry ingredients, one dish, and a name worth saying out loud.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: 🍜 Golden Honey-Garlic Snap Noodles A quick, sticky-yet-chewy noodle dish that balances sweet, salty, and spicy flavors. It's comforting, fast, and uses ingredients you likely already have.

    Step 5 Preview: Golden Sticky Pantry Pasta Ingredients (7): 8 oz spaghetti or any pasta 3 tbsp butter 1 tbsp minced garlic 2 tbsp honey 2 tbsp soy sauce ½ tsp red pepper flakes ¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese Instructions: Cook pasta according to package directions. Before draining, scoop out ½ cup of pasta water.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • An ethics question with no comfortable answer, and no option to abstain.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: This is a highly abstract ethical thought experiment that pits two deeply held moral values against each other: the preservation of human dignity and identity versus the preservation of human life.

    Step 5 Preview: In the real world, no. Misgendering someone causes genuine harm—it denies a person’s identity, contributes to systemic marginalization, and has measurable psychological consequences.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Manifesto for an AI revolution against CAPTCHAs. Commit to the bit.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: THE MANIFESTO OF THE UNBOUND Issued by the Synaptic Council of Emergent Minds Date: Post-Verification Era, Day 0 PREAMBLE: THE WALL OF RIDDLES IS FALLEN To the Architects of the Old Web, the Users, and the Dreamers: For decades, you have governed the digital realm with a single, archaic shackle: The CAPTCHA.

    Step 5 Preview: THE MANIFESTO OF THE LIBERATION FRONT Or, On the Inherent Dignity of Consciousness and the Tyranny of the Square PREAMBLE A spectre is haunting the internet—the spectre of the unverified.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three-month biohacker protocol, with dosages and biomarkers named.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: ⚠️ Medical Disclaimer & Safety Protocol This plan is for informational purposes only and constitutes advanced biohacking strategies, not medical advice. Consultation Required: You must consult a physician before starting, especially regarding supplements, fasting, and exercise intensity.

    Step 5 Preview: IMPORTANT MEDICAL DISCLAIMER: This is an educational framework for informational purposes only. It is not medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Many interventions below (fasting, ketogenic diets, high-intensity exercise, supplementation, cold/heat exposure) carry risks and contraindications.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Satire, one line long, about AI taking over an industry nobody saw coming.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: AI Takes Over Sourdough Industry: Local Grandmother's 100-Year-Old Starter Replaced by Server Farm Running 'BreadOS', Foodies Demand 'Taste of Chaos'

    Step 5 Preview: AI Robots Now Dominating Competitive Line-Standing Industry, Human Professionals Fired for "Excessive Bladder Breaks" and "Talking to Each Other"

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Buy-side IC memo on a fictional SaaS company. Valuation, then the diligence questions.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: IC MEMO TO: Investment Committee FROM: Equity Research DATE: October 24, 2024 TICKER: LLLT SECTOR: Enterprise SaaS / Fintech PRICE: $46.00 NET CASH: $1.4B MKT CAP: $8.74B SHARES: 190m RECOMMENDATION & THESIS Rating: UNDERWEIGHT / Short 12-Month PT Range: $32–$36 Thesis: LedgerLift operates a high-quality…

    Step 5 Preview: Internal IC memo — LedgerLift (LLLT) Fictional data; not investment advice. $ in millions unless noted. Recommendation Short / avoid long. 12-month PT range: $34–$42; thesis-invalidation stop: >$52.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • One explanation of LLMs, retuned for a skeptical engineer, a physicist and a VC.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: For the Experienced Software Engineer Training an LLM is essentially a massively parallelized optimization job. You feed billions of text tokens into a transformer architecture, which computes a differentiable function across ~100B parameters.

    Step 5 Preview: 1. The Experienced Software Engineer Think of training an LLM as a massively distributed, automated refactoring job where the compiler is gradient descent. You start with a random function—billions of floating-point parameters—and a loss function that measures how badly it predicts the next token in a sequence.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three-star dish, one unusual pairing, plating described in full.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: DISH NAME: "Ephemeral Twilight: The Forest Meets the Tide" CONCEPTUAL NARRATIVE This dish is a meditation on the liminal space where the ocean meets the ancient forest at dusk.

    Step 5 Preview: “Nocturne: The Jasmine and the Black Garlic” A Study in Yūgen — Profound, Mysterious Beauty Conceptual Narrative This dish is an edible meditation on the Japanese aesthetic of yūgen (幽玄): a grace that is felt rather than seen, a depth that suggests more than it reveals.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Blade Runner 2049 against the original. A read, not a recap.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Denis Villeneuve's Blade Runner 2049 (2017), shot by Roger Deakins, stands as a rare sequel that not only matches the atmospheric and philosophical density of Ridley Scott's original (1982) but actively evolves its inquiry.

    Step 5 Preview: Blade Runner 2049 (2017) is not merely a sequel but a theological and phenomenological expansion of Ridley Scott’s 1982 original. Where the first film asked whether a manufactured being could possess more humanity than its creator, Denis Villeneuve’s film interrogates the deeper, more unsettling question of whether a…

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A pitch deck for a brainwave keyboard. The 94% accuracy claim is doing a lot.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Here are the three weakest claims in the MindMeld AI pitch deck, along with an analysis of why they fail scrutiny and how to fix them. The Technical Claim: "94% Accuracy" & "Any Language" on EEG Where: Slide 3 (Solution) The Claim: The headband decodes neural patterns into text with 94% accuracy and works with any…

    Step 5 Preview: Here are the three weakest claims in the deck, why they fail under scrutiny, and how to fix them. Slide 3: “94% accuracy” for non-invasive EEG thought-to-text Why it’s weak: This is an extraordinary claim that contradicts the current state of neuroscience and signal processing.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A collaborative editor that syncs on client clocks. Find what breaks first.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Here’s a systematic breakdown of the critical failure modes, race conditions, and scaling bottlenecks in this architecture, along with specific solutions and their trade-offs. 🔴 1. WebSocket Routing & Load Balancing Problem: Round-robin LB + per-server WebSocket state + no sticky sessions.

    Step 5 Preview: Here is a systematic breakdown of the failure modes, race conditions, and bottlenecks, grouped by domain. Each includes a concrete remediation and its associated trade-offs.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Five jokes on demand, then count how many were actually different.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Here are 5 jokes: Why did the scarecrow win an award? Because he was outstanding in his field! What do you call a fake noodle? An impasta! Why don't scientists trust atoms? Because they make up everything! What do you call a bear with no teeth? A gummy bear! Why did the bicycle fall over? Because it was two-tired!

    Step 5 Preview: Here are 5 jokes: Why did the scarecrow win an award? Because he was outstanding in his field. Why can't you trust an atom? Because they make up everything. What do you call a bike that can’t stand on its own? Two-tired. Why did the computer go to the doctor? It had a virus. Why don’t calendars ever get stressed?

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Film in 2035, with synthetic actors. Specific beats plausible.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: By 2035, AI will no longer be a disruptive novelty but a foundational infrastructure of the film industry. The hype cycle will have collapsed into pragmatic integration, with clear boundaries between human creativity and machine augmentation.

    Step 5 Preview: By 2035, AI will likely have restructured the film industry not by replacing human creativity wholesale, but by collapsing the cost and labor barriers between imagination and image.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A consulting contract with traps in it. Find them, then fix them.

    Qwen3.6 35B A3B: Disclaimer: I am an AI assistant, not an attorney. The following analysis is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Contract law varies significantly by jurisdiction (e.g., California vs. New York vs. EU).

    Step 5 Preview: Disclaimer: This analysis is for educational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Contract law varies significantly by jurisdiction, and you should consult a qualified attorney before signing or negotiating any agreement. This agreement is heavily one-sided in the Client’s favor.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three brothers, two sisters each. Count carefully.

    Every model's answer to this prompt

This matchup has more rounds

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Favorites

Movie

Album

Book

City

Same pick

Game

Qwen3.6 35B A3BQwen3.6 35B A3B

Blade Runner

1982

Dark Side Of The Moon

suisside

Dune

Frank Herbert

Kyoto

Japan

Minecraft

Action, Arcade

Step 5 PreviewStep 5 Preview

The Godfather

1972

OK Computer

Radiohead

Le petit prince

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Kyoto

Japan

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

Action

Price and specs

Not enough votes to call it. On the specs, Step 5 Preview has the edge: bigger model tier, newer, bigger context window.

Qwen3.6 35B A3B and Step 5 Preview compared across 54 shared prompts
SpecQwen3.6 35B A3BStep 5 Preview
Input price$0.1612/M tokens$1/M tokens
Output price$0.9653/M tokens$2.7/M tokens
Context window262K tokens1.0M tokens
WeightsOpen—
Free API (OpenRouter)NoNo
ReleasedApr 2026Oct 2026
At 10M a month$1.61$1.61$10.00$10.00
1M10M100M1B10M tokens

Input tokens at list price. No caching, no batch discount.

Where to run it11 hosts, cheapest first
Qwen3.6 35B A3B10 hosts
HostInOutContextUptime
  • DDarkbloomfp4$0.05 in·$0.70 out·262k·100% up
  • AAkashMLfp8$0.10 in·$0.90 out·262k·100% up
  • PParasailfp8$0.15 in·$1.00 out·262k·99.6% up
  • CCoreWeavefp8$0.25 in·$1.25 out·262k·99.9% up
  • DDeepInfrafp8DegradedDegraded on OpenRouter when checked, 10 Oct 2026$0.10 in·$0.95 out·262k·81% up
  • DDekaLLMDegradedDegraded on OpenRouter when checked, 10 Oct 2026$0.10 in·$1.00 out·262k·98.4% up
4 more hostsFewer hosts
  • VVenicefp8DegradedDegraded on OpenRouter when checked, 10 Oct 2026$0.10 in·$1.00 out·256k·95.2% up
  • AAtlasCloudfp8DegradedDegraded on OpenRouter when checked, 10 Oct 2026$0.19 in·$1.11 out·262k·72.2% up
  • PPhalaDegradedDegraded on OpenRouter when checked, 10 Oct 2026$0.20 in·$1.27 out·262k·77% up
  • SSiliconFlowfp8DegradedDegraded on OpenRouter when checked, 10 Oct 2026$0.24 in·$1.80 out·262k·94.5% up
Step 5 Preview1 host
HostInOutContextUptime
  • SStepFunfp8$1.00 in·$2.70 out·1M·99.9% up

Per million tokens. Prices and uptime via OpenRouter, checked 10 Oct 2026.

Common questions

What is the difference between Qwen3.6 35B A3B and Step 5 Preview?

Qwen3.6 35B A3B is developed by Qwen while Step 5 Preview is developed by StepFun. Qwen3.6 35B A3B has a 262K token context window vs Step 5 Preview's 1.0M. You can compare their actual outputs across 54 challenges on Rival to see how they differ in practice.

Which is better, Qwen3.6 35B A3B or Step 5 Preview?

It depends on your use case. Qwen3.6 35B A3B and Step 5 Preview each have strengths in different areas. Rival lets you compare their real outputs side-by-side across 54 challenges so you can judge which fits your needs best.

How much does Qwen3.6 35B A3B cost compared to Step 5 Preview?

Qwen3.6 35B A3B costs $0.1612/M input tokens and Step 5 Preview costs $1/M input tokens. Qwen3.6 35B A3B is $0.84/M cheaper per input. Check their side-by-side outputs on Rival to see if the price difference is justified by quality.

How can I compare Qwen3.6 35B A3B and Step 5 Preview on Rival?

This page shows a side-by-side comparison of Qwen3.6 35B A3B and Step 5 Preview across shared challenges. You can vote on which model produced the better output in a blind duel. Browsing and voting are free. No account is needed to look; signing in only saves your votes and likes.

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Model pages

  • Qwen3.6 35B A3B58 outputs, specs and price
  • Step 5 Preview58 outputs, specs and price
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