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Kimi K2.8 Preview vs Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Comparing Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct across benchmarks, pricing, and capabilities.

Moonshot AI · Meta · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct trade strengths across price, capabilities, and technical limits. The better choice depends on the workload.

Kimi K2.8 Preview also accepts a larger context window (1,048,576 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 Kimi K2.8 Preview

  • you process long inputs — it offers a 1,048,576 token context window
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Sep 2026

Choose Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Kimi K2.8 Preview
Moonshot AI
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Meta
Benchmark wins
—
—
Input price
— / M
$0.02 / M
Output price
— / M
$0.03 / M
Context window
1,048,576
131,072

Individual benchmarks

0 reported for Kimi K2.8 Preview · 18 for Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

No common benchmarks found

Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instructdon't have any common benchmark datasets to compare. They may have been evaluated on different testing suites.

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Kimi K2.8 Preview accepts 1,048,576 input tokens compared to Llama 3.1 8B Instruct's 131,072 tokens. Only Llama 3.1 8B Instruct specifies output context (131,072 tokens).

Moonshot AI
Kimi K2.8 Preview
Input1,048,576 tokens
Output- tokens
Meta
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Input131,072 tokens
Output131,072 tokens
Mon Sep 14 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Kimi K2.8 Preview supports multimodal inputs, whereas Llama 3.1 8B Instruct does not.

Kimi K2.8 Preview can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Kimi K2.8 Preview

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Kimi K2.8 Preview 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.

Kimi K2.8 Preview

Proprietary

Closed source

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Llama 3.1 Community License

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Kimi K2.8 Preview was released on 2026-09-11, while Llama 3.1 8B Instruct was released on 2024-07-23.

Kimi K2.8 Preview is 26 months newer than Llama 3.1 8B Instruct.

Kimi K2.8 Preview

Sep 11, 2026

3 days ago

2.1yr newer
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Jul 23, 2024

2.1 years ago

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-12-31, while Kimi K2.8 Preview'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 Kimi K2.8 Preview's cutoff date.

Kimi K2.8 Preview

—

Llama 3.1 8B Instruct

Dec 2023

Provider Availability

Kimi K2.8 Preview is available from Moonshot AI. Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is available from DeepInfra, Lambda, Groq, Sambanova, Cerebras, Hyperbolic, Together, Fireworks, Bedrock.

Kimi K2.8 Preview

moonshot logo
Unknown Organization

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 Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Kimi K2.8 Preview
✓ Preferred
Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Kimi K2.8 Preview vs Llama 3.1 8B Instruct.

Which is better, Kimi K2.8 Preview or Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Kimi K2.8 Preview (Moonshot AI) and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct (Meta) each have strengths in different areas. Compare their benchmark scores, pricing, context windows, and capabilities above to determine which fits your needs.

How does Kimi K2.8 Preview compare to Llama 3.1 8B Instruct in benchmarks?

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%.

What are the context window sizes for Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Kimi K2.8 Preview supports 1.0M 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 Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Key differences include context window (1.0M vs 131K), 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 Kimi K2.8 Preview and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?

Kimi K2.8 Preview is developed by Moonshot AI and Llama 3.1 8B Instruct is developed by Meta.

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