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Claude 3 Sonnet vs Hermes 3 405B

Claude 3 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B are closely matched at 1.8 and 4.4 on the LLM Stats Score. Hermes 3 405B is 6.0x cheaper per token.

Anthropic · Nous Research · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Claude 3 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B are closely matched on the overall LLM Stats Score at 1.8 and 4.4.

The models split the 4 individual benchmarks reported for both models evenly.

On price, Hermes 3 405B is roughly 6.0x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.

Claude 3 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 Sonnet

  • you process long inputs — it offers a 200,000 token context window

Choose Hermes 3 405B

  • cost matters — it's about 6.0x cheaper per token
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Oct 2024
  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Claude 3 Sonnet
Anthropic
Hermes 3 405B
Nous Research
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
1.8
#317
4.4
#299
Reasoning
1.7
#308
3.8
#297
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
2 of 4
2 of 4
Input price
$3.00 / M
$1.00 / M
Output price
$15.00 / M
$1.00 / M
Context window
200,000
131,072

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

3 shared
Index
Claude 3 Sonnet
Hermes 3 405B
Math
7.4#263
6.7#267
Finance
3.1#180
7.5#158
Legal
3.1#168
8.7#137
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

11 reported for Claude 3 Sonnet · 13 for Hermes 3 405B

4 shared

Claude 3 Sonnet outperforms in 2 benchmarks (ARC-C, MMLU-Pro), while Hermes 3 405B is better at 2 benchmarks (HellaSwag, MMLU).

Both models are evenly matched across the benchmarks.

Wed Sep 09 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Pricing Analysis

Price comparison per million tokens

Hermes 3 405B costs less

For input processing, Claude 3 Sonnet ($3.00/1M tokens) is 3.0x more expensive than Hermes 3 405B ($1.00/1M tokens).

For output processing, Claude 3 Sonnet ($15.00/1M tokens) is 15.0x more expensive than Hermes 3 405B ($1.00/1M tokens).

In conclusion, Claude 3 Sonnet is more expensive than Hermes 3 405B.*

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

Lowest available price from all providers
Wed Sep 09 2026 • llm-stats.com
Anthropic
Claude 3 Sonnet
Input tokens$3.00
Output tokens$15.00
Best providerAnthropic
Nous Research
Hermes 3 405B
Input tokens$1.00
Output tokens$1.00
Best providerDeepinfra
Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue→

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Claude 3 Sonnet accepts 200,000 input tokens compared to Hermes 3 405B's 131,072 tokens. Claude 3 Sonnet can generate longer responses up to 200,000 tokens, while Hermes 3 405B is limited to 131,072 tokens.

Anthropic
Claude 3 Sonnet
Input200,000 tokens
Output200,000 tokens
Nous Research
Hermes 3 405B
Input131,072 tokens
Output131,072 tokens
Wed Sep 09 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Claude 3 Sonnet supports multimodal inputs, whereas Hermes 3 405B does not.

Claude 3 Sonnet can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Claude 3 Sonnet

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Hermes 3 405B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Claude 3 Sonnet is licensed under a proprietary license, while Hermes 3 405B uses Apache 2.0.

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

Claude 3 Sonnet

Proprietary

Closed source

Hermes 3 405B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Claude 3 Sonnet was released on 2024-02-29, while Hermes 3 405B was released on 2024-10-09.

Hermes 3 405B is 7 months newer than Claude 3 Sonnet.

Claude 3 Sonnet

Feb 29, 2024

2.5 years ago

Hermes 3 405B

Oct 9, 2024

1.9 years ago

7mo newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Provider Availability

Claude 3 Sonnet is available from Anthropic, Bedrock, Google. Hermes 3 405B is available from DeepInfra.

Claude 3 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

Hermes 3 405B

deepinfra logo
Deepinfra
Input Price:Input: $1.00/1MOutput Price:Output: $1.00/1M
* 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 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Claude 3 Sonnet
✓ Preferred
Hermes 3 405B
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Claude 3 Sonnet vs Hermes 3 405B.

Which is better, Claude 3 Sonnet or Hermes 3 405B?

Claude 3 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B are closely matched on the LLM Stats Score at 1.8 and 4.4. Claude 3 Sonnet is made by Anthropic and Hermes 3 405B is made by Nous Research. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does Claude 3 Sonnet compare to Hermes 3 405B in benchmarks?

Claude 3 Sonnet scores ARC-C: 93.2%, GSM8k: 92.3%, HellaSwag: 89.0%, MGSM: 83.5%, BIG-Bench Hard: 82.9%. Hermes 3 405B scores HellaSwag: 90.2%, MT-Bench: 89.3%, BoolQ: 88.9%, Winogrande: 86.3%, ARC-E: 86.2%.

Is Claude 3 Sonnet cheaper than Hermes 3 405B?

Hermes 3 405B is 3.0x cheaper for input tokens. Claude 3 Sonnet costs $3.00/M input and $15.00/M output via anthropic. Hermes 3 405B costs $1.00/M input and $1.00/M output via deepinfra.

What are the context window sizes for Claude 3 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B?

Claude 3 Sonnet supports 200K tokens and Hermes 3 405B 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 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (1.8 vs 4.4), context window (200K vs 131K), input pricing ($3.00 vs $1.00/M), multimodal support (yes vs no), licensing (Proprietary vs Apache 2.0). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Claude 3 Sonnet and Hermes 3 405B?

Claude 3 Sonnet is developed by Anthropic and Hermes 3 405B is developed by Nous Research.

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