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Model comparison

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning vs Qwen3.5

NVIDIANemotron 3.5 Lightning
Input
$0.08
Output
$0.20
Context
1M (256K on a single H100)
Released
2026-08-11
Full model page →Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen3.5
Input
$0.54 / 1M tokens
Output
$3.40 / 1M tokens
Context
256K
Released
2026-02-16
Full model page →
Short answer

Qwen3.5 scores higher on 5 of the 5 benchmarks both models report; Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is cheaper on input tokens ($0.1 vs $0.5 per 1M, 6.8×); Nemotron 3.5 Lightning has the larger context window (1M vs 256K).

Specs and pricing side by side

SpecNemotron 3.5 LightningQwen3.5
MakerNVIDIAAlibaba (Qwen)
Released2026-08-112026-02-16
Context window1M (256K on a single H100)256K
Input price$0.08$0.54 / 1M tokens
Output price$0.20$3.40 / 1M tokens
Parameters30B total · 3B active (Mixture-of-Experts)397B total / 17B active (MoE, 512 experts)
LicenseOpenMDW-1.1Apache-2.0
WeightsOpen weightsOpen weightssame
ModalitiesTextText, Vision, Video, PDF
Knowledge cutoffSeptember 2025 (pre-training); May 2026…not published

Not published by either maker: max output.

Benchmarks both models report

BenchmarkNemotron 3.5 LightningQwen3.5
MMLU Pro81.94%87.8%
GPQA Diamond75.44%88.4%
IFBench71.88%76.5%
SWE-bench Verified51.56%76.4%
BrowseComp36.97%78.6%

Scores are as published by each maker or its cited source; harness, reasoning effort and date can differ between rows, so treat small gaps as ties. Sources are listed on each model page.

Which one should you pick?

Pick Nemotron 3.5 Lightning if…

  • Cost matters: input tokens cost 6.8× less ($0.1 vs $0.5 per 1M).
  • You need the longer context (1M vs 256K).
  • Your use case is: the execution tier of an agent stack, handling routine tool calls and sub-steps while a larger model makes the hard decisions.

Pick Qwen3.5 if…

  • You care about MMLU Pro, GPQA Diamond, IFBench (it scores higher on 5 shared benchmarks).
  • You need Vision / Video / PDF input, which Nemotron 3.5 Lightning lacks.
  • Your use case is: self-hosted agentic systems that need open weights for tool use, browsing, and terminal/coding workflows.

FAQ

Which is better, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning or Qwen3.5?

Qwen3.5 scores higher on 5 of the 5 benchmarks both models report; Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is cheaper on input tokens ($0.1 vs $0.5 per 1M, 6.8×); Nemotron 3.5 Lightning has the larger context window (1M vs 256K). The better pick depends on whether you value benchmark scores, price per token, context length or openness for your workload.

How much cheaper is Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: $0.08 input, $0.20 output. Qwen3.5: $0.54 / 1M tokens input, $3.40 / 1M tokens output (list API prices as published by each maker).

What are the context windows of Nemotron 3.5 Lightning and Qwen3.5?

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning offers 1M (256K on a single H100); Qwen3.5 offers 256K.

Is Nemotron 3.5 Lightning newer than Qwen3.5?

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning was released 2026-08-11; Qwen3.5 was released 2026-02-16.

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