Cohere Embed v3 vs Qwen3 Embedding 8B

Detailed comparison between Cohere Embed v3 and Qwen3 Embedding 8B. See which embedding best meets your accuracy and performance needs.

Model Comparison

Qwen3 Embedding 8B takes the lead.

Both Cohere Embed v3 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 27 higher ELO rating
  • Qwen3 Embedding 8B delivers better accuracy (nDCG@10: 0.818 vs 0.686)
  • Qwen3 Embedding 8B has a 6.9% higher win rate

Overview

Key metrics

ELO Rating

Overall ranking quality

Cohere Embed v3

1488

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

1516

Win Rate

Head-to-head performance

Cohere Embed v3

41.0%

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

47.9%

Accuracy (nDCG@10)

Ranking quality metric

Cohere Embed v3

0.686

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

0.818

Average Latency

Response time

Cohere Embed v3

7ms

Qwen3 Embedding 8B

50ms

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

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Overall Performance
ELO Rating
1488
1516
Overall ranking quality based on pairwise comparisons
Win Rate
41.0%
47.9%
Percentage of comparisons won against other models
Pricing & Availability
Price per 1M tokens
$0.100
$0.050
Cost per million tokens processed
Dimensions
1024
4096
Vector embedding dimensions (lower is more efficient)
Release Date
2024-02-07
2025-06-06
Model release date
Accuracy Metrics
Avg nDCG@10
0.686
0.818
Normalized discounted cumulative gain at position 10
Performance Metrics
Avg Latency
7ms
50ms
Average response time across all datasets

Dataset Performance

By field

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

PG

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
Latency Metrics
Mean
6ms
26ms
Average response time
P50
6ms
25ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
7ms
30ms
90th percentile

business reports

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
Latency Metrics
Mean
6ms
136ms
Average response time
P50
6ms
134ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
7ms
157ms
90th percentile

DBPedia

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.634
0.633
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.619
0.625
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.219
0.235
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.353
0.381
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
6ms
40ms
Average response time
P50
6ms
39ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
7ms
46ms
90th percentile

FiQa

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.641
0.760
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.650
0.781
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.639
0.732
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.678
0.814
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
7ms
38ms
Average response time
P50
6ms
37ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
8ms
43ms
90th percentile

SciFact

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.729
0.750
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.769
0.765
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.788
0.843
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.900
0.883
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
8ms
40ms
Average response time
P50
8ms
39ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
9ms
46ms
90th percentile

MSMARCO

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
1.000
1.000
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.996
1.000
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.123
0.123
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.218
0.224
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
6ms
36ms
Average response time
P50
6ms
35ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
7ms
41ms
90th percentile

NorQuAD

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
Latency Metrics
Mean
9ms
46ms
Average response time
P50
9ms
45ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
10ms
53ms
90th percentile

ARCD

MetricCohere Embed v3Qwen3 Embedding 8BDescription
Accuracy Metrics
nDCG@5
0.349
0.913
Ranking quality at top 5 results
nDCG@10
0.398
0.919
Ranking quality at top 10 results
Recall@5
0.380
0.920
% of relevant docs in top 5
Recall@10
0.520
0.940
% of relevant docs in top 10
Latency Metrics
Mean
11ms
41ms
Average response time
P50
11ms
40ms
50th percentile (median)
P90
12ms
47ms
90th percentile

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