Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Claude Haiku 4.5 leads Nemotron 3.5 Lightning on coding, 35.6 to 22.6 on the Vibe Coding Index, and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs 34.0x less per output token ($0.147 vs $5.00 per million). Updated October 22, 2026; 14 benchmarks have a result for both.
Claude Haiku 4.5 or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: which to pick
Pick Claude Haiku 4.5 for coding: it scores 35.6 on the Vibe Coding Index against 22.6 for Nemotron 3.5 Lightning.
Pick Nemotron 3.5 Lightning for output tokens 34.0x cheaper ($0.147 vs $5.00 per million) and a lower cost per solved task ($0.06 against $0.56).
- Shared results
- 14
- Claude Haiku 4.5 only
- 81
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning only
- 6
- Like-for-like categories
- 5 of 9
Only benchmarks that tested both models count toward a pick; a result only one model has is shown but not compared.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, six public coding benchmarks
Claude Haiku 4.5
Claude Haiku 4.5 scores 35.6 against 22.6.
4 and 2 benchmarks behind the scores
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
Claude Haiku 4.5
Claude Haiku 4.5 leads, 16.9 against 12.9.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
Claude Haiku 4.5
Claude Haiku 4.5 leads, 8.0 against 3.5.
Same board, both measured
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only Claude Haiku 4.5 has a GPQA Diamond result, 72.2%.
Directional only
Math
AIME
No call
Only Claude Haiku 4.5 has a AIME result, 82.7%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only Claude Haiku 4.5 has a MMLU Pro result, 78.7%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
No call
Only Claude Haiku 4.5 has a Design Arena: websites result, 1122.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning takes 262K tokens against 200K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Claude Haiku 4.5 $0.0035, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning $0.0001 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Claude Haiku 4.5 $0.56, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning $0.06.
Published attempt cost and pass rate
At a glance
- Coding index
- Claude Haiku 4.5 35.6 from 4 benchmarks, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 22.6 from 2 benchmarks.
- Widest category
- General, 81.0 points apart on average over 1 shared benchmark.
- Widest single gap
- MedScribe (Vals AI): Claude Haiku 4.5 85.2% against Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 4.3%, 81.0 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Claude Haiku 4.5 $5.00 against Nemotron 3.5 Lightning $0.147 per million output tokens, 34.0x apart.
- Context window
- Claude Haiku 4.5 takes 200K tokens, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 262K.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Bars | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 5 | 0 | 1 tie | |
| Intelligence | 1 | 0 | ||
| Agentic work | 5 | 0 | ||
| Knowledge | 1 | 0 | ||
| General | 1 | 0 | ||
| All shared boards | 13 | 0 | 1 tie |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index50
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE-bench Verified | 66.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| SWE-bench Multilingual | 64.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LiveBench coding | 48.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1330 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| AA Coding Index | 43.9 | 26.8 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 41.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 66.6% | 52.8% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 11.4% | 0.0% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | 7.5% | 3.0% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | 0.0% | 0.0% | Tie |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | 43.8% | 10.9% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 29.5% | Only Nemotron 3.5 Lightning measured |
| SciCode | Not measured | 32.1% | Only Nemotron 3.5 Lightning measured |
| Terminal-Bench | 35.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| WeirdML | 45.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| ALE-Bench | Not measured | 769.2 | Only Nemotron 3.5 Lightning measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1454 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1439 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1326 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1318 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 19 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 16.9 | 12.9 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 142.2 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
Agentic workLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index50
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 8.0 | 3.5 | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| LiveBench research | 42.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LiveBench browser | 40.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LiveBench long agentic | 11.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | 31.0% | 18.5% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | 5.9% | 2.6% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | 10.6% | 2.9% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | 22.7% | 17.0% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| BALROG | 31.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| DeepResearch Bench | 45.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | $459 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard (BFCL) | 68.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 29 boards here | |||
ReasoningDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index12 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 72.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LiveBench reasoning | 61.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | 46.1% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 74.3% | Only Nemotron 3.5 Lightning measured |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 10.6% | Only Nemotron 3.5 Lightning measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | 71.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| ARC-AGI | 47.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 4.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Chess puzzles | 8.0% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1421 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1443 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1435 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 10 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index6 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | 82.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | 92.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | 66.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MATH level 5 | 96.4% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1398 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1430 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 7 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 78.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 81.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| CaseLaw (Vals AI) | 56.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 60.6% | 54.2% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 67.5% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | 62.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | 79.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | 32.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | 13.2% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1406 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1394 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1400 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1400 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
Web designDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index9 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1122 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1097 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1097 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1124 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1071 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1114 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1025 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | 1140 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LiveBench design | 59.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench data analysis | 59.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | 54.3% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | 31.8% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | 85.2% | 4.3% | Claude Haiku 4.5 |
| Vals Multimodal Index | 42.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | Not measured | 60.3% | Only Nemotron 3.5 Lightning measured |
| DTBench | 73.6% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMCA | 30.9% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| ExploitBench | 13.7% | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text | 1397 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1414 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1371 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: English | 1414 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1377 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1418 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: German | 1374 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1338 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1346 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: French | 1411 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1421 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1381 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1343 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1409 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1427 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1386 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1369 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| LMArena Document | 1420 | Not measured | Only Claude Haiku 4.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 19 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Claude Haiku 4.5 | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | Anthropic Claude Haiku 4.5 | NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Anthropic | NVIDIA |
| Weights | No public weights listed | Open weights |
| Released | October 15, 2025 | August 11, 2026 |
| Context window | 200K | 262K |
| Input $/Mtok | $1.00 | $0.0534 |
| Output $/Mtok | $5.00 | $0.147 |
| Coding index | 35.6 | 22.6 |
| Independent measurements behind it | 4 | 2 |
| Cost per solved task | $0.56 | $0.06 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Claude Haiku 4.5 better than Nemotron 3.5 Lightning for coding?
Pick Claude Haiku 4.5 for coding: it scores 35.6 on the Vibe Coding Index against 22.6 for Nemotron 3.5 Lightning. Pick Nemotron 3.5 Lightning for output tokens 34.0x cheaper ($0.147 vs $5.00 per million) and a lower cost per solved task ($0.06 against $0.56).
Which is cheaper, Claude Haiku 4.5 or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?
Claude Haiku 4.5 costs $1.00 per million input tokens and $5.00 per million output tokens; Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs $0.0534 and $0.147. Per solved SWE-bench Verified task, Claude Haiku 4.5 costs $0.56 and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning $0.06.
Which has the bigger context window, Claude Haiku 4.5 or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning, with 262K tokens against 200K.
How many benchmarks is the Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning comparison based on?
14 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 22, 2026. Claude Haiku 4.5's coding index rests on 4 independent benchmarks and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning's on 2. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.