Model comparison
Granite 4.2 3b vs Nova 2 Lite
Granite 4.2 3b and Nova 2 Lite score almost the same on the Noometry Index (39.4 vs 39.7), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.
Last verified . 11 shared benchmarks.
Summary
- They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 3b scores higher in 0 categories and Nova 2 Lite in 7 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Nova 2 Lite leads 43.0 to 36.3.
- Granite 4.2 3b has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Amazon |
| Noometry Index | 39.4 | 39.7 |
| Released | — | 2025-12-01 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | — | 1M |
| Max output | — | 64K |
| Input $ / M tokens | — | $0.30 |
| Output $ / M tokens | — | $2.50 |
| Results tracked | 11 | 19 |
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Category by category
Coding Too close to call
Granite 4.2 3b: 40.0 (#151), Nova 2 Lite: 40.7 (#134)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1361 | 1385 |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Granite 4.2 3b: —, Nova 2 Lite: 24.1 (#121)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 27.1% |
Reasoning Nova 2 Lite leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 26.0 (#138), Nova 2 Lite: 27.5 (#118)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1306 | 1364 |
Math Not comparable
Granite 4.2 3b: —, Nova 2 Lite: 37.5 (#156)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | — | 1359 |
Knowledge Nova 2 Lite leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 36.3 (#171), Nova 2 Lite: 43.0 (#94)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1315 | 1358 |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 5.1% |
Multilingual Nova 2 Lite leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 42.1 (#198), Nova 2 Lite: 47.1 (#153)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1268 | 1337 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1269 | 1364 |
| LMArena Russian | 1249 | 1343 |
| LMArena French | — | 1381 |
| LMArena German | — | 1343 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1271 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1284 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1373 |
Instruction Following Nova 2 Lite leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 67.1 (#200), Nova 2 Lite: 70.5 (#161)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1273 | 1335 |
Long Context Nova 2 Lite leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 39.2 (#185), Nova 2 Lite: 40.6 (#150)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1291 | 1335 |
Writing & Preference Nova 2 Lite leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 47.2 (#212), Nova 2 Lite: 53.9 (#154)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1293 | 1362 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1205 | 1291 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1290 | 1338 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Granite 4.2 3b better than Nova 2 Lite?
Granite 4.2 3b and Nova 2 Lite score almost the same on the Noometry Index (39.4 vs 39.7), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.
Is Granite 4.2 3b or Nova 2 Lite better for coding?
They score almost the same on coding (40.0 vs 40.7); test both on your own repository before choosing.
How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 3b and Nova 2 Lite share?
11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 3b has 11 scored results on Noometry and Nova 2 Lite has 19.