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Kimi K2 Instruct vs Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

Kimi K2 Instruct leads the LLM Stats Score 21.9 to 4.8.

Moonshot AI · NVIDIA · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Kimi K2 Instruct leads the overall LLM Stats Score 21.9 to 4.8, ranking #186 overall.

In the 4 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Kimi K2 Instruct wins 4; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.

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

Choose Kimi K2 Instruct

  • overall performance matters — it scores 21.9 and ranks #186 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning — it leads those capability indexes
  • you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 4 of 4 exact shared results
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Jul 2025

Choose Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

  • you are already invested in the NVIDIA ecosystem

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Kimi K2 Instruct
Moonshot AI
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1
NVIDIA
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
21.9
#186
4.8
#304
Reasoning
22.0
#176
5.3
#299
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
4 of 4
0 of 4
Input price
$0.50 / M
— / M
Output price
$0.50 / M
— / M
Context window
200,000
—

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

1 shared
Index
Kimi K2 Instruct
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1
Math
22.2#142
8.8#258
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

38 reported for Kimi K2 Instruct · 7 for Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

4 shared

Kimi K2 Instruct outperforms in 4 benchmarks (AIME 2025, GPQA, IFEval, MATH-500), while Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 is better at 0 benchmarks.

Kimi K2 Instruct significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Tue Sep 22 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

992.0B diff

Kimi K2 Instruct has 992.0B more parameters than Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1, making it 12400.0% larger.

Moonshot AI
Kimi K2 Instruct
1.0Tparameters
NVIDIA
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1
8.0Bparameters
1000.0B
Kimi K2 Instruct
8.0B
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Kimi K2 Instruct specifies input context (200,000 tokens). Only Kimi K2 Instruct specifies output context (200,000 tokens).

Moonshot AI
Kimi K2 Instruct
Input200,000 tokens
Output200,000 tokens
NVIDIA
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Tue Sep 22 2026 • llm-stats.com

License

Usage and distribution terms

Kimi K2 Instruct is licensed under MIT, while Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 uses Llama 3.1 Community License.

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

Kimi K2 Instruct

MIT

Open weights

Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

Llama 3.1 Community License

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Kimi K2 Instruct was released on 2025-07-11, while Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 was released on 2025-03-18.

Kimi K2 Instruct is 4 months newer than Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1.

Kimi K2 Instruct

Jul 11, 2025

1.2 years ago

3mo newer
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

Mar 18, 2025

1.5 years ago

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-12-31, while Kimi K2 Instruct's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1's training data extends to 2023-12-31, but cannot make a direct comparison without Kimi K2 Instruct's cutoff date.

Kimi K2 Instruct

—

Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1

Dec 2023

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Kimi K2 Instruct and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Kimi K2 Instruct
✓ Preferred
Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Kimi K2 Instruct vs Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1.

Which is better, Kimi K2 Instruct or Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1?

Kimi K2 Instruct leads the LLM Stats Score 21.9 to 4.8. Kimi K2 Instruct is made by Moonshot AI and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 is made by NVIDIA. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does Kimi K2 Instruct compare to Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 in benchmarks?

Kimi K2 Instruct scores MATH-500: 97.4%, GSM8k: 97.3%, CBNSL: 95.6%, HumanEval: 93.3%, MMLU-Redux: 92.7%. Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 scores MATH-500: 95.4%, MBPP: 84.6%, MT-Bench: 81.0%, IFEval: 79.3%, BFCL v2: 63.6%.

What are the context window sizes for Kimi K2 Instruct and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1?

Kimi K2 Instruct supports 200K tokens and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 supports an unknown number of tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Kimi K2 Instruct and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (21.9 vs 4.8), licensing (MIT vs Llama 3.1 Community License). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Kimi K2 Instruct and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1?

Kimi K2 Instruct is developed by Moonshot AI and Llama 3.1 Nemotron Nano 8B V1 is developed by NVIDIA.

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