Model comparison
Llama 3-8B vs Nova 2 Lite
Nova 2 Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 25.3 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3-8B costs 6.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Nova 2 Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.
MetaSummary
- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Llama 3-8B scores higher in 0 categories and Nova 2 Lite in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Nova 2 Lite leads 42.5 to 7.8.
- Llama 3-8B is cheaper at $0.14 / $0.14 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $2.50 for Nova 2 Lite.
- Nova 2 Lite accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 8K.
- Llama 3-8B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Meta | Amazon |
| Noometry Index | 25.3 | 39.0 |
| Released | 2024-04-18 | 2025-12-01 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | 8K | 1M |
| Max output | 8K | 64K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.14 | $0.30 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.14 | $2.50 |
| Results tracked | 34 | 19 |
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Category by category
Coding Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 30.5 (#285), Nova 2 Lite: 40.1 (#131)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1152 | 1386 |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 31.9% | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 36.9% | — |
| HumanEval+ | 56.7% | — |
| MBPP+ | 54.8% | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Llama 3-8B: —, Nova 2 Lite: 23.9 (#114)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 27.1% |
Reasoning Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 13.8 (#321), Nova 2 Lite: 26.4 (#120)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1133 | 1364 |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| DTBench | 43.9% | — |
| Adversarial NLI | 57.3% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 116.33 | — |
| ForecastBench | 58.6 | — |
| WinoGrande | 75.7% | — |
Math Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 8.3 (#317), Nova 2 Lite: 34.8 (#154)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1151 | 1359 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 1.9% | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 6.1% | — |
Knowledge Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 7.8 (#303), Nova 2 Lite: 42.5 (#88)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1113 | 1360 |
| GPQA Diamond | 26.1% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 5.1% |
| ARC (AI2) Challenge | 82.8% | — |
| MMLU | 68.8% | — |
| OpenBookQA | 82.6% | — |
| TriviaQA | 67.7% | — |
Multilingual Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 31.0 (#256), Nova 2 Lite: 47.3 (#148)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1098 | 1337 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1076 | 1364 |
| LMArena French | 1158 | 1381 |
| LMArena German | 1104 | 1343 |
| LMArena Japanese | 967 | 1273 |
| LMArena Korean | 1003 | 1284 |
| LMArena Russian | 1109 | 1343 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1172 | 1372 |
Instruction Following Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 58.7 (#255), Nova 2 Lite: 70.7 (#156)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1127 | 1335 |
Long Context Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 34.2 (#246), Nova 2 Lite: 40.6 (#145)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1128 | 1335 |
Writing & Preference Nova 2 Lite leads
Llama 3-8B: 37.7 (#251), Nova 2 Lite: 54.1 (#150)
| Benchmark | Llama 3-8B | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1166 | 1362 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1150 | 1291 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1152 | 1338 |
Frequently asked questions
Is Llama 3-8B better than Nova 2 Lite?
Nova 2 Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 25.3 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3-8B costs 6.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Nova 2 Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Llama 3-8B or Nova 2 Lite?
Llama 3-8B is cheaper. It lists at $0.14 per million input tokens and $0.14 per million output tokens; Nova 2 Lite lists at $0.30 and $2.50.
Is Llama 3-8B or Nova 2 Lite better for coding?
Nova 2 Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 30.5 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Nova 2 Lite does, with 1M tokens against 8K.
How many benchmarks do Llama 3-8B and Nova 2 Lite share?
17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Llama 3-8B has 34 scored results on Noometry and Nova 2 Lite has 19.