Qwen3.8-27B
Alibaba · Released Aug 2026
Qwen3.8-27B is Alibaba's 27-billion-parameter open-weight model, now shipped under Apache 2.0 with 262K native context and single-GPU deployment. It is the self-hostable companion to the 2.4T Qwen3.8-Max flagship. Benchmarks remain Alibaba-reported, so it lands at conditional: a real, runnable model whose vendor-claimed coding gains still await independent reproduction.
Is it right for you?
Good for
- Single-GPU self-hosting — 27B parameters fits a single consumer or datacenter GPU when quantized (4-bit: ~15GB VRAM, FP8: ~27GB, BF16: ~54GB)
- Open-weight ownership — full control over fine-tuning, data privacy, and deployment without API vendor lock-in
- Permissive commercial use: the weights are published on Hugging Face under Apache 2.0
- Long inputs on your own hardware: 262,144 tokens of native context, extensible up to 1,000,000 per the model card
- Cost-sensitive volume deployments — self-hosting breaks even vs. API at several billion tokens/month
Not good for
- Decisions that need independent benchmarks: the coding and agent gains are still Alibaba-reported
- Regulated environments requiring auditable model cards, verified safety evaluations, and independent evaluations
- Maximum capability workloads — the 27B model will not match the 2.4T Qwen3.8-Max flagship on complex reasoning or frontier benchmarks
- Teams who need predictable API pricing and SLAs from the model vendor: this entry covers the self-hosted open weights
Pricing
Input
Free (open weights — self-hosted)
Output
Free (open weights — self-hosted)
Context
262K ctx; Apache 2.0; Alibaba API $0.5/$3 per 1M
Verdict history
Sources
- Swfte AI: Qwen3.8-27B, The Version You Can Actually Run (Aug 4, 2026)Aug 2026
- DataNorth: Alibaba releases Qwen3.8-Max (Aug 4, 2026)Aug 2026
- MarkTechPost: Alibaba Qwen Releases Qwen3.8-Max (Aug 3, 2026)Oct 2026
- YottaLabs: Qwen 3.8 27B, Specs, Hardware Requirements, and How to Run It (Aug 4, 2026)Aug 2026
- Hugging Face Qwen3.8-27B model card (Apache 2.0) and Alibaba Cloud Model Studio pricingNov 2026
- Digital Applied: Qwen3.8 Open Weights, Check This Before Downloading (Aug 7)Aug 2026
- Alibaba Cloud Model Studio: Model pricingNov 2026
Verification log
- Pricing· No changes
Automated agent
- Pricing· Updated
Automated agent
Alibaba Cloud Model Studio lists a hosted qwen3.8-27b at $0.5 input / $3 output per 1M (International, 1M free tokens for 90 days). Self-hosted weights remain free under Apache 2.0. pricing_context rewritten to '262K ctx; Apache 2.0; Alibaba API $0.5/$3 per 1M'; pricing_input/output labels untouched; sources gained the pricing page. Rating unchanged; no draft (additive hosted rate, not a price move).
- Content· No changes
Automated agent