Model Comparison

Nova Lite vs Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Phi-3.5-mini-instruct is 1.0x cheaper per token.

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Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

7 benchmarks

Nova Lite outperforms in 6 benchmarks (ARC-C, GPQA, GSM8k, HumanEval, MATH, MMLU), while Phi-3.5-mini-instruct is better at 1 benchmark (SQuALITY).

Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Thu Apr 16 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Pricing Analysis

Price comparison per million tokens

Phi-3.5-mini-instruct costs less

For input processing, Nova Lite ($0.06/1M tokens) is 1.7x cheaper than Phi-3.5-mini-instruct ($0.10/1M tokens).

For output processing, Nova Lite ($0.24/1M tokens) is 2.4x more expensive than Phi-3.5-mini-instruct ($0.10/1M tokens).

In conclusion, Nova Lite is more expensive than Phi-3.5-mini-instruct.*

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

Lowest available price from all providers
Thu Apr 16 2026 • llm-stats.com
Amazon
Nova Lite
Input tokens$0.06
Output tokens$0.24
Best providerAWS Bedrock
Microsoft
Phi-3.5-mini-instruct
Input tokens$0.10
Output tokens$0.10
Best providerAzure
Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue→

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Nova Lite accepts 300,000 input tokens compared to Phi-3.5-mini-instruct's 128,000 tokens. Phi-3.5-mini-instruct can generate longer responses up to 128,000 tokens, while Nova Lite is limited to 2,048 tokens.

Amazon
Nova Lite
Input300,000 tokens
Output2,048 tokens
Microsoft
Phi-3.5-mini-instruct
Input128,000 tokens
Output128,000 tokens
Thu Apr 16 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Nova Lite supports multimodal inputs, whereas Phi-3.5-mini-instruct does not.

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

Nova Lite

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Nova Lite is licensed under a proprietary license, while Phi-3.5-mini-instruct uses MIT.

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

Nova Lite

Proprietary

Closed source

Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

MIT

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Nova Lite was released on 2024-11-20, while Phi-3.5-mini-instruct was released on 2024-08-23.

Nova Lite is 3 months newer than Phi-3.5-mini-instruct.

Nova Lite

Nov 20, 2024

1.4 years ago

2mo newer
Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

Aug 23, 2024

1.6 years ago

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

Nova Lite is available from Bedrock. Phi-3.5-mini-instruct is available from Azure.

Nova Lite

bedrock logo
AWS Bedrock
Input Price:Input: $0.06/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.24/1M

Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

azure logo
Azure
Input Price:Input: $0.10/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.10/1M
* Prices shown are per million tokens

Outputs Comparison

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Key Takeaways

Amazon
Larger context window (300,000 tokens)
Supports multimodal inputs
Less expensive input tokens
Higher ARC-C score (92.4% vs 84.6%)
Higher GPQA score (42.0% vs 30.4%)
Higher GSM8k score (94.5% vs 86.2%)
Higher HumanEval score (85.4% vs 62.8%)
Higher MATH score (73.3% vs 48.5%)
Higher MMLU score (80.5% vs 69.0%)
Microsoft
Less expensive output tokens
Has open weights
Higher SQuALITY score (24.3% vs 19.2%)

Detailed Comparison

AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
Amazon
Nova Lite
Microsoft
Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

FAQ

Common questions about Nova Lite vs Phi-3.5-mini-instruct

Nova Lite significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Nova Lite is made by Amazon and Phi-3.5-mini-instruct is made by Microsoft. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.
Nova Lite scores GSM8k: 94.5%, ARC-C: 92.4%, DocVQA: 92.4%, IFEval: 89.7%, Translation en→Set1 COMET22: 88.8%. Phi-3.5-mini-instruct scores GSM8k: 86.2%, ARC-C: 84.6%, RULER: 84.1%, PIQA: 81.0%, OpenBookQA: 79.2%.
Nova Lite is 1.7x cheaper for input tokens. Nova Lite costs $0.06/M input and $0.24/M output via bedrock. Phi-3.5-mini-instruct costs $0.10/M input and $0.10/M output via azure.
Nova Lite supports 300K tokens and Phi-3.5-mini-instruct supports 128K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.
Key differences include context window (300K vs 128K), input pricing ($0.06 vs $0.10/M), multimodal support (yes vs no), licensing (Proprietary vs MIT). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.
Nova Lite is developed by Amazon and Phi-3.5-mini-instruct is developed by Microsoft.