Model comparison
Claude Sonnet 5 vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Claude Sonnet 5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.6 to 40.0 on the Noometry Index. Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs 46× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 18 shared benchmarks.
NVIDIASummary
- They share 18 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 5 scores higher in 8 categories and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Claude Sonnet 5 leads 66.2 to 37.5.
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.20 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $10 for Claude Sonnet 5.
- Claude Sonnet 5 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 262K.
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Anthropic | NVIDIA |
| Noometry Index | 54.6 | 40.0 |
| Released | 2026-06-29 | 2026-08-11 |
| Weights | Proprietary | Open |
| Context window | 1M | 262K |
| Max output | 128K | 262K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $2 | $0.05 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $10 | $0.20 |
| Results tracked | 51 | 18 |
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Category by category
Coding Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 55.5 (#26), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 40.4 (#141)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1483 | 1375 |
| DeepSWE | 53.8% | — |
| FrontierCode | 42.7% | — |
| CursorBench | 34.1% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1541 | — |
| SciCode | 54.3% | — |
| GSO | 37.3% | — |
| WeirdML | 68.8% | — |
| ALE-Bench | 1,463 | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 5: 42.8 (#18), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| APEX-Agents | 54.5% | — |
| GBAEval | 65.3% | — |
| LMArena Search | 1194 | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 6,378 | — |
Reasoning Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 49.1 (#39), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 26.8 (#127)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1461 | 1337 |
| SimpleBench | 60.6% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 75.1% | — |
| CritPt | 16.9% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 35% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 35% | — |
| DTBench | 92.5% | — |
| LMCA | 50% | — |
| Surface Evolver Bench | 60% | — |
| Bench to the Future 3 | 0.14 | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 156.21 | — |
| ForecastBench | 61.1 | — |
Math Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 66.2 (#27), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 37.5 (#155)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1467 | 1359 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 65.6% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 29.3% | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 94.7% | — |
| ProofBench | 77% | — |
Knowledge Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 55.6 (#47), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 37.5 (#154)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1490 | 1356 |
| GPQA Diamond | 90.5% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 33.7% | — |
Multimodal Not comparable
Claude Sonnet 5: 42.4 (#31), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: —
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1274 | — |
| Blueprint-Bench 2 | 24.9% | — |
| LMArena Document | 1466 | — |
Multilingual Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 53.8 (#55), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 44.0 (#180)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1431 | 1295 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1477 | 1359 |
| LMArena French | 1460 | 1366 |
| LMArena German | 1440 | 1282 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1422 | 1206 |
| LMArena Korean | 1411 | 1238 |
| LMArena Russian | 1451 | 1253 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1437 | 1345 |
Instruction Following Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 76.3 (#41), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 69.6 (#170)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1452 | 1318 |
Long Context Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 44.8 (#55), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 39.9 (#165)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1463 | 1314 |
Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 5 leads
Claude Sonnet 5: 69.2 (#25), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 48.5 (#201)
| Benchmark | Claude Sonnet 5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1442 | 1327 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1416 | 1254 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1794 | 1280 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1454 | 1328 |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1236 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Claude Sonnet 5 better than Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?
Claude Sonnet 5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.6 to 40.0 on the Noometry Index. Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs 46× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5 or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.20 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 5 lists at $2 and $10.
Is Claude Sonnet 5 or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning better for coding?
Claude Sonnet 5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 55.5 versus 40.4 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Claude Sonnet 5 does, with 1M tokens against 262K.
How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 5 and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning share?
18 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 5 has 51 scored results on Noometry and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning has 18.