GPT-5.1 High vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B): Specs & Benchmark Comparison
GPT-5.1 High is developed by OpenAI, while Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) comes from NVIDIA. GPT-5.1 High was released in November 2025, and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) followed 9 months later in August 2026. Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) has a published size of about 30 billion parameters; OpenAI has not disclosed the parameter count of GPT-5.1 High.
We have 3 benchmark results for GPT-5.1 High and 13 benchmark results for Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B), but they overlap on a single test: GPQA, where GPT-5.1 High scores 88.0% against 75.0%.
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) is the cheaper API at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.20 per million output tokens, roughly 40 times cheaper than GPT-5.1 High at $2 and $8. Both accept a context window of about 256K tokens. GPT-5.1 High accepts text and images as input, while Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) accepts text.
| Characteristic | GPT-5.1 High | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) |
|---|---|---|
| Company | OpenAI | NVIDIA |
| Release Date | November 11, 2025 | August 11, 2026 |
| Parameters | — | 30B |
| Multimodal | Yes | No |
| Context (input) | 256K | 262K |
| Context (output) | 128K | 262K |
| Input Price / 1M | $2.00 | $0.05 |
| Output Price / 1M | $8.00 | $0.20 |
| Average Score | 86.7% | 45.3% |
| Benchmarks | ||
| GPQA | 88.0% | 75.0% |
Visual Benchmark Comparison
Verdict
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) leads in 3 out of 4 comparison categories.
Both models show comparable average scores: GPT-5.1 High — 0.9, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) — 0.5.
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) is 40.0x cheaper: input $0.05/1M vs $2.00/1M tokens.
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) supports a larger context: 262K vs 256K tokens.
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) is newer: released 8/11/2026 vs 11/11/2025.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Which is better for coding — GPT-5.1 High or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B)?
Which model is cheaper — GPT-5.1 High or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B)?
Which has a larger context window — GPT-5.1 High or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B)?
The GPT-5.1 High and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) comparison is updated for 2026. Data includes benchmark results, API pricing, context window size and other specifications. For more detailed information, visit the GPT-5.1 High or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) page. See also the complete list of AI model comparisons.