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Claude 3.5 Sonnet vs Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Claude 3.5 Sonnet leads the LLM Stats Score 19.1 to -2.6. Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is 266.7x cheaper per token.

Anthropic · Meta · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet leads the overall LLM Stats Score 19.1 to -2.6, ranking #213 overall.

In the 5 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Claude 3.5 Sonnet wins 5; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.

On price, Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is roughly 266.7x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet also accepts a larger context window (200,000 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Claude 3.5 Sonnet

  • overall performance matters — it scores 19.1 and ranks #213 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning — it leads those capability indexes
  • you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 5 of 5 exact shared results
  • you process long inputs — it offers a 200,000 token context window
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Oct 2024

Choose Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

  • cost matters — it's about 266.7x cheaper per token
  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Anthropic
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Meta
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
19.1
#213
-2.6
#345
Reasoning
20.1
#195
-3.6
#343
Coding
11.4
#161
-2.3
#255
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
5 of 5
0 of 5
Input price
$3.00 / M
$0.02 / M
Output price
$15.00 / M
$0.03 / M
Context window
200,000
131,072

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

4 shared
Index
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Math
23.2#133
-2.5#312
Tool use
8.2#144
17.0#76
Finance
23.3#69
-3.0#207
Legal
23.3#57
-3.0#192
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

19 reported for Claude 3.5 Sonnet · 18 for Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

5 shared

Claude 3.5 Sonnet outperforms in 5 benchmarks (DROP, GPQA, HumanEval, MMLU, MMLU-Pro), while Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is better at 0 benchmarks.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Sun Sep 27 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Pricing Analysis

Price comparison per million tokens

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct costs less

For input processing, Claude 3.5 Sonnet ($3.00/1M tokens) is 150.0x more expensive than Llama 3.1 8B Instruct ($0.02/1M tokens).

For output processing, Claude 3.5 Sonnet ($15.00/1M tokens) is 500.0x more expensive than Llama 3.1 8B Instruct ($0.03/1M tokens).

In conclusion, Claude 3.5 Sonnet is more expensive than Llama 3.1 8B Instruct.*

* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens

Lowest available price from all providers
Sun Sep 27 2026 • llm-stats.com
Anthropic
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Input tokens$3.00
Output tokens$15.00
Best providerAnthropic
Meta
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Input tokens$0.02
Output tokens$0.03
Best providerDeepinfra
Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue→

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Claude 3.5 Sonnet accepts 200,000 input tokens compared to Llama 3.1 8B Instruct's 131,072 tokens. Claude 3.5 Sonnet can generate longer responses up to 200,000 tokens, while Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is limited to 131,072 tokens.

Anthropic
Claude 3.5 Sonnet
Input200,000 tokens
Output200,000 tokens
Meta
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Input131,072 tokens
Output131,072 tokens
Sun Sep 27 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Claude 3.5 Sonnet supports multimodal inputs, whereas Llama 3.1 8B Instruct does not.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is licensed under a proprietary license, while Llama 3.1 8B Instruct uses Llama 3.1 Community License.

License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Proprietary

Closed source

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Llama 3.1 Community License

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Claude 3.5 Sonnet was released on 2024-10-22, while Llama 3.1 8B Instruct was released on 2024-07-23.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is 3 months newer than Llama 3.1 8B Instruct.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

Oct 22, 2024

1.9 years ago

3mo newer
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Jul 23, 2024

2.2 years ago

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-12-31, while Claude 3.5 Sonnet's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Llama 3.1 8B Instruct's training data extends to 2023-12-31, but cannot make a direct comparison without Claude 3.5 Sonnet's cutoff date.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

—

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Dec 2023

Provider Availability

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is available from Anthropic, Bedrock, Google. Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is available from DeepInfra, Lambda, Groq, Sambanova, Cerebras, Hyperbolic, Together, Fireworks, Bedrock.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet

anthropic logo
Anthropic
Input Price:Input: $3.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $15.00/1M
bedrock logo
AWS Bedrock
Input Price:Input: $3.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $15.00/1M
google logo
Google
Input Price:Input: $3.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $15.00/1M

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

deepinfra logo
Deepinfra
Input Price:Input: $0.02/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.04/1M
lambda logo
Lambda
Input Price:Input: $0.03/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.03/1M
groq logo
Groq
Input Price:Input: $0.05/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.08/1M
sambanova logo
Sambanova
Input Price:Input: $0.10/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.20/1M
cerebras logo
Cerebras
Input Price:Input: $0.10/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.10/1M
hyperbolic logo
Hyperbolic
Input Price:Input: $0.10/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.10/1M
together logo
Together
Input Price:Input: $0.20/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.20/1M
fireworks logo
Fireworks
Input Price:Input: $0.20/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.20/1M
bedrock logo
AWS Bedrock
Input Price:Input: $0.22/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.22/1M
* Prices shown are per million tokens

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Claude 3.5 Sonnet
✓ Preferred
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Claude 3.5 Sonnet vs Llama 3.1 8B Instruct.

Which is better, Claude 3.5 Sonnet or Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet leads the LLM Stats Score 19.1 to -2.6. Claude 3.5 Sonnet is made by Anthropic and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is made by Meta. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does Claude 3.5 Sonnet compare to Llama 3.1 8B Instruct in benchmarks?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet scores GSM8k: 96.4%, DocVQA: 95.2%, AI2D: 94.7%, HumanEval: 93.7%, BIG-Bench Hard: 93.1%. Llama 3.1 8B Instruct scores GSM-8K (CoT): 84.5%, ARC-C: 83.4%, API-Bank: 82.6%, IFEval: 80.4%, BFCL: 76.1%.

Is Claude 3.5 Sonnet cheaper than Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is 150.0x cheaper for input tokens. Claude 3.5 Sonnet costs $3.00/M input and $15.00/M output via anthropic. Llama 3.1 8B Instruct costs $0.02/M input and $0.03/M output via deepinfra.

What are the context window sizes for Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet supports 200K tokens and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct supports 131K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (19.1 vs -2.6), context window (200K vs 131K), input pricing ($3.00 vs $0.02/M), multimodal support (yes vs no), licensing (Proprietary vs Llama 3.1 Community License). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Claude 3.5 Sonnet and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Claude 3.5 Sonnet is developed by Anthropic and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is developed by Meta.

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