Model comparison
Llama 3.1-8B vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.0 to 23.0 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3.1-8B costs 1.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Nemotron 3.5 Lightning's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 18 shared benchmarks.
Meta
NVIDIASummary
- They share 18 benchmarks with published results for both. Llama 3.1-8B scores higher in 0 categories and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads 37.5 to 8.0.
- Llama 3.1-8B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.08 per million input/output tokens, against $0.05 / $0.20 for Nemotron 3.5 Lightning.
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 128K.
Side by side
| Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Meta | NVIDIA |
| Noometry Index | 23.0 | 40.0 |
| Released | 2024-07-23 | 2026-08-11 |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | 128K | 262K |
| Max output | 4K | 262K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.05 | $0.05 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.08 | $0.20 |
| Results tracked | 43 | 18 |
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Category by category
Coding Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 20.2 (#340), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 40.4 (#141)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1195 | 1375 |
| SciCode | 13.2% | — |
| WeirdML | 1.7% | — |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 32.8% | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 40.5% | — |
| HumanEval+ | 62.8% | — |
| MBPP+ | 55.6% | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Llama 3.1-8B: 22.5 (#131), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: —
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 25.8% | — |
| BALROG | 15.1% | — |
Reasoning Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 14.9 (#321), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 26.8 (#127)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1175 | 1337 |
| CritPt | 0% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| DTBench | 50.9% | — |
| LMCA | 5.4% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 116.57 | — |
| PIQA | 81.2% | — |
Math Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 10.2 (#317), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 37.5 (#155)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1179 | 1359 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 1.7% | — |
| Omni-MATH | 13.7% | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 22.9% | — |
| GSM8K | 82.4% | — |
Knowledge Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 8.0 (#307), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 37.5 (#154)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1144 | 1356 |
| GPQA Diamond | 27% | — |
| MMLU-Pro | 40.6% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 24.7% | — |
| BoolQ | 82.8% | — |
| MMLU | 56.1% | — |
Multilingual Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 34.0 (#249), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 44.0 (#180)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1148 | 1295 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1151 | 1359 |
| LMArena French | 1177 | 1366 |
| LMArena German | 1144 | 1282 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1061 | 1206 |
| LMArena Korean | 1053 | 1238 |
| LMArena Russian | 1158 | 1253 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1169 | 1345 |
Instruction Following Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 58.9 (#258), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 69.6 (#170)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1159 | 1318 |
| IFEval | 74.3% | — |
Long Context Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 35.8 (#238), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 39.9 (#165)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1182 | 1314 |
Writing & Preference Nemotron 3.5 Lightning leads
Llama 3.1-8B: 29.7 (#290), Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 48.5 (#201)
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1-8B | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1187 | 1327 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1154 | 1254 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 713 | 1280 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1172 | 1328 |
| WildBench | 68.7% | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Llama 3.1-8B better than Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.0 to 23.0 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3.1-8B costs 1.5× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Nemotron 3.5 Lightning's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Llama 3.1-8B or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?
Llama 3.1-8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.08 per million output tokens; Nemotron 3.5 Lightning lists at $0.05 and $0.20.
Is Llama 3.1-8B or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning better for coding?
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.4 versus 20.2 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning does, with 262K tokens against 128K.
How many benchmarks do Llama 3.1-8B and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning share?
18 benchmarks have published results for both models. Llama 3.1-8B has 43 scored results on Noometry and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning has 18.