BAAI/bge-m3 vs Qwen3 Embedding 8B

Detailed comparison between BAAI/bge-m3 and Qwen3 Embedding 8B. See which embedding best meets your accuracy and performance needs. If you want to compare these models on your data, try Agentset.

Model Comparison

Qwen3 Embedding 8B takes the lead.

Both BAAI/bge-m3 and Qwen3 Embedding 8B are powerful embedding models designed to improve retrieval quality in RAG applications. However, their performance characteristics differ in important ways.

Why Qwen3 Embedding 8B:

  • Qwen3 Embedding 8B has 30 higher ELO rating
  • Qwen3 Embedding 8B delivers better accuracy (nDCG@10: 0.718 vs 0.674)

Overview

Key metrics

ELO Rating

Overall ranking quality

BAAI/bge-m3

1480

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

1510

Win Rate

Head-to-head performance

BAAI/bge-m3

44.3%

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

48.8%

Accuracy (nDCG@10)

Ranking quality metric

BAAI/bge-m3

0.674

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

0.718

Average Latency

Response time

BAAI/bge-m3

34ms

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

41ms

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Visual Performance Analysis

Performance

ELO Rating Comparison

Win/Loss/Tie Breakdown

Accuracy Across Datasets (nDCG@10)

Latency Distribution (ms)

Breakdown

How the models stack up

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Overall Performance
ELO Rating
1480
1510
Overall ranking quality based on pairwise comparisons
Win Rate
44.3%
48.8%
Percentage of comparisons won against other models
Pricing & Availability
Price per 1M tokens
$0.010
$0.050
Cost per million tokens processed
Dimensions
1024
4096
Vector embedding dimensions (lower is more efficient)
Release Date
2024-01-27
2025-06-06
Model release date
Accuracy Metrics
Avg nDCG@10
0.674
0.718
Normalized discounted cumulative gain at position 10
Performance Metrics
Avg Latency
34ms
41ms
Average response time across all datasets

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Dataset Performance

By field

Comprehensive comparison of accuracy metrics (nDCG, Recall) and latency percentiles for each benchmark dataset.

business reports

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.000
0.000
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.000
0.000
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.000
0.000
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.000
0.000
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
27ms
48ms
Average response time
P50
27ms
48ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
27ms
48ms
90th percentile

DBPedia

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.801
0.806
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.785
0.797
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.061
0.062
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.122
0.123
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
21ms
49ms
Average response time
P50
21ms
49ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
21ms
49ms
90th percentile

FiQa

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.743
0.884
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.755
0.880
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.608
0.736
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.667
0.818
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
22ms
30ms
Average response time
P50
22ms
30ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
22ms
30ms
90th percentile

SciFact

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.571
0.739
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.599
0.744
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.645
0.840
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.759
0.881
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
37ms
41ms
Average response time
P50
37ms
41ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
37ms
41ms
90th percentile

MSMARCO

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.956
0.945
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.941
0.937
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.121
0.123
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.219
0.223
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
51ms
39ms
Average response time
P50
51ms
39ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
51ms
39ms
90th percentile

ARCD

MetricBAAI/bge-m3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.879
0.851
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.879
0.857
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.960
0.920
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.960
0.940
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
48ms
35ms
Average response time
P50
48ms
35ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
48ms
35ms
90th percentile

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