API cost decision in 10 seconds

Qwen3.5-9B vs GLM 5V Turbo

Pick Qwen3.5-9B when budget and context both matter.

Page updated: 2026-05-26T15:08:08Z Data confirmed: 2026-05-26T19:08:13Z Prices normalized to USD per 1M tokens Sample workload: 1M input + 500K output

Budget verdict

Pick Qwen3.5-9B when budget and context both matter.

On the standard 1M input plus 500K output workload, Qwen3.5-9B is estimated at $0.11 vs $3.2 for GLM 5V Turbo, saving $3.08 (96.4% lower).

Cost-first pickQwen3.5-9B

Context-first pickQwen3.5-9B

Sample savings$3.0896.4%

10x traffic gap$30.85

Qwen3.5-9B is cheaper on the standard workload and also has the larger context window. At 10x that traffic, the same price gap is about $30.85. Use the calculator below to replace the sample workload with your own token volume.

Cost sensitivity

Workload Sensitivity

Same prices, different token mixes.

Qwen3.5-9B stays cheaper across input-heavy, balanced, and output-heavy sample workloads.

Workload shape	Token mix	Better pick	Qwen3.5-9B	GLM 5V Turbo
Input-heavy / RAG	5M input + 500K output	Qwen3.5-9B	$0.28	$8
Balanced workload	1M input + 1M output	Qwen3.5-9B	$0.19	$5.2
Output-heavy chatbot	1M input + 5M output	Qwen3.5-9B	$0.79	$21.2

Cheaper input Qwen3.5-9B $0.04 vs $1.2 / 1M

Qwen3.5-9B is $1.16 cheaper per 1M input tokens (96.7% lower; 30x difference).

Cheaper output Qwen3.5-9B $0.15 vs $4 / 1M

Qwen3.5-9B is $3.85 cheaper per 1M output tokens (96.2% lower; 26.7x difference).

Larger context Qwen3.5-9B 262.14K vs 202.75K

Qwen3.5-9B has 59.39K more context (1.29x larger).

Sample workload Qwen3.5-9B $0.11 vs $3.2

Qwen3.5-9B is $3.08 cheaper on the standard workload (96.4% lower).

Estimate your workload cost

Your Workload Cost

Prices are normalized to USD per 1M tokens.

Monthly input tokens Monthly output tokens

Qwen3.5-9B Calculating… Estimated API cost

GLM 5V Turbo Calculating… Estimated API cost

Cheaper for this workload Calculating… Difference: calculating…

This estimate uses normalized public API pricing per 1M tokens. It is a planning aid, not a billing quote. Verify provider pricing, limits, and terms before production use.

Quick Decision

Verdict

Qwen3.5-9B has the lower input price; Qwen3.5-9B has the lower output price; Qwen3.5-9B offers the larger context window. For the 1M input plus 500K output sample, Qwen3.5-9B is cheaper for the standard workload.

For a 1M input token plus 500K output token workload, the estimated API cost is $0.11 for Qwen3.5-9B and $3.2 for GLM 5V Turbo.

Best Fit

Choose Qwen3.5-9B when you care most about lower input-token price, lower output-token price, and larger context window.

Choose GLM 5V Turbo when its provider, model quality, latency, or availability is more important than the numeric price/context winner.

Decision Notes

On the standard 1M input plus 500K output workload, Qwen3.5-9B is estimated at $0.11 vs $3.2 for GLM 5V Turbo, saving $3.08 (96.4% lower).
Qwen3.5-9B is $3.08 cheaper on the standard workload (96.4% lower).
Qwen3.5-9B is $1.16 cheaper per 1M input tokens (96.7% lower; 30x difference).
Qwen3.5-9B is $3.85 cheaper per 1M output tokens (96.2% lower; 26.7x difference).
Qwen3.5-9B has 59.39K more context (1.29x larger).

Head-to-Head Specs

Feature	Qwen3.5-9B (Qwen)	GLM 5V Turbo (Z.ai)
Input Price prompt tokens per 1M	$0.04	$1.2
Completion Price per 1M tokens	$0.15	$4
Sample Workload Cost 1M input + 500K output	$0.11	$3.2
Context Window	262.14K	202.75K
Release Date	2026-03-10	2026-04-01
Popularity	#61	#136

Use-Case Decision Matrix

Use case	Better pick	Why
Budget-constrained production	Qwen3.5-9B	On the standard 1M input plus 500K output workload, Qwen3.5-9B is estimated at $0.11 vs $3.2 for GLM 5V Turbo, saving $3.08 (96.4% lower).
High-volume input processing	Qwen3.5-9B	Lower prompt-token price matters most when prompts, retrieved passages, or documents dominate the bill.
Long responses and chatbots	Qwen3.5-9B	Lower output-token price matters most when assistants generate many completion tokens.
RAG or long-document work	Qwen3.5-9B	A larger context window leaves more room for retrieved passages, conversation history, or source files.

Related Alternatives

Same-provider lower-cost swaps

Qwen3 Next 80B A3B Instruct (free) can replace Qwen3.5-9B when lower sample workload cost matters most: $0.
Qwen3 Coder 480B A35B (free) can replace Qwen3.5-9B when lower sample workload cost matters most: $0.
Qwen2.5 7B Instruct can replace Qwen3.5-9B when lower sample workload cost matters most: $0.09.
GLM 4.5 Air (free) can replace GLM 5V Turbo when lower sample workload cost matters most: $0.

Larger context near this budget

Llama 4 Scout offers 10M context with $0.23 sample workload cost.
Grok 4.20 offers 2M context with $2.5 sample workload cost.
Owl Alpha offers 1.05M context with $0 sample workload cost.
DeepSeek V4 Flash offers 1.05M context with $0.2 sample workload cost.

Popular competitors

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Hy3 preview · Tencent · #2
Claude Opus 4.7 · Anthropic · #3
Claude Sonnet 4.6 · Anthropic · #4

Cheaper alternatives

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Larger context alternatives

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Provider catalogs

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Qwen catalog

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Z.ai catalog

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Open Z.ai models

Qwen3.5-9B

Qwen3.5-9B is a multimodal foundation model from the Qwen3.5 family, designed to deliver strong reasoning, coding, and visual understanding in an efficient 9B-parameter architecture. It uses a unified vision-language design...

GLM 5V Turbo

GLM-5V-Turbo is Z.ai’s first native multimodal agent foundation model, built for vision-based coding and agent-driven tasks. It natively handles image, video, and text inputs, excels at long-horizon planning, complex coding,...