Model Comparison

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct vs Nova LiteWhich is better in 2026?

Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Verdict: Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct vs Nova Lite — which is better?

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct (by NVIDIA) and Nova Lite (by Amazon) are two of the AI models people compare most. Here is how they stack up on benchmarks, price and capabilities, and which one to pick in 2026.

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Nova Lite is better at 3 benchmarks (ARC-C, GSM8k, MMLU). Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Choose Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct if…

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

Choose Nova Lite if…

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 3 of 3 shared benchmarks
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Nov 2024

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

3 benchmarks

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Nova Lite is better at 3 benchmarks (ARC-C, GSM8k, MMLU).

Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Wed Aug 05 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Nova Lite specifies input context (300,000 tokens). Only Nova Lite specifies output context (2,048 tokens).

NVIDIA
Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Amazon
Nova Lite
Input300,000 tokens
Output2,048 tokens
Wed Aug 05 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Nova Lite supports multimodal inputs, whereas Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct does not.

Nova Lite can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Nova Lite

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct is licensed under Llama 3.1 Community License, while Nova Lite uses a proprietary license.

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

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct

Llama 3.1 Community License

Open weights

Nova Lite

Proprietary

Closed source

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct was released on 2024-10-01, while Nova Lite was released on 2024-11-20.

Nova Lite is 2 months newer than Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct.

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct

Oct 1, 2024

1.8 years ago

Nova Lite

Nov 20, 2024

1.7 years ago

1mo newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-12-01, while Nova Lite's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct's training data extends to 2023-12-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Nova Lite's cutoff date.

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct

Dec 2023

Nova Lite

—

Outputs Comparison

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Key Takeaways

NVIDIA
Has open weights
Amazon
Larger context window (300,000 tokens)
Supports multimodal inputs
Higher ARC-C score (92.4% vs 69.2%)
Higher GSM8k score (94.5% vs 91.4%)
Higher MMLU score (80.5% vs 80.2%)

Detailed Comparison

Interactive Arena

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct and Nova Lite side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct
✓ Preferred
Nova Lite
Open in Playground
AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
NVIDIA
Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct
Amazon
Nova Lite

FAQ

Common questions about Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct vs Nova Lite.

Which is better, Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct or Nova Lite?

Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct is made by NVIDIA and Nova Lite is made by Amazon. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct compare to Nova Lite in benchmarks?

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct scores GSM8k: 91.4%, HellaSwag: 85.6%, Winogrande: 84.5%, GSM8K Chat: 81.9%, MMLU Chat: 80.6%. Nova Lite scores GSM8k: 94.5%, ARC-C: 92.4%, DocVQA: 92.4%, IFEval: 89.7%, Translation en→Set1 COMET22: 88.8%.

What are the context window sizes for Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct and Nova Lite?

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct supports an unknown number of tokens and Nova Lite supports 300K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct and Nova Lite?

Key differences include multimodal support (no vs yes), licensing (Llama 3.1 Community License vs Proprietary). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct and Nova Lite?

Llama 3.1 Nemotron 70B Instruct is developed by NVIDIA and Nova Lite is developed by Amazon.

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