Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) vs Seed 2.1 Turbo: Specs & Benchmark Comparison
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) is developed by NVIDIA, while Seed 2.1 Turbo comes from ByteDance. Seed 2.1 Turbo was released in June 2026, and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) followed 2 months later in August 2026. Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) has a published size of about 30 billion parameters; ByteDance has not disclosed the parameter count of Seed 2.1 Turbo.
The two models share 4 published benchmarks. Seed 2.1 Turbo leads on 4 of them. The widest gaps are on BrowseComp, where Seed 2.1 Turbo scores 84.9% against 37.0%; Terminal-Bench 2.1, where Seed 2.1 Turbo scores 67.6% against 24.6%. Averaged across everything we track, Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) sits at 45.3% and Seed 2.1 Turbo at 61.0%.
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) is available through an API at $0.05 per million input tokens with a 262K-token context window. We do not track a hosted API for Seed 2.1 Turbo, so pricing and context cannot be compared directly.
| Characteristic | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) | Seed 2.1 Turbo |
|---|---|---|
| Company | NVIDIA | ByteDance |
| Release Date | August 11, 2026 | June 24, 2026 |
| Parameters | 30B | — |
| Multimodal | No | Yes |
| Context (input) | 262K | — |
| Context (output) | 262K | — |
| Input Price / 1M | $0.05 | — |
| Output Price / 1M | $0.20 | — |
| Average Score | 45.3% | 61.0% |
| Benchmarks | ||
| BrowseComp | 37.0% | 84.9% |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | 24.6% | 67.6% |
| Humanity's Last Exam | 11.7% | 54.6% |
| SciCode | 32.6% | 57.8% |
Visual Benchmark Comparison
Verdict
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) leads in 1 out of 2 comparison categories.
Both models show comparable average scores: Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) — 0.5, Seed 2.1 Turbo — 0.6.
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) is newer: released 8/11/2026 vs 6/24/2026.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Which is better for coding — Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) or Seed 2.1 Turbo?
Which model is cheaper — Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) or Seed 2.1 Turbo?
Which has a larger context window — Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) or Seed 2.1 Turbo?
The Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) and Seed 2.1 Turbo comparison is updated for 2026. Data includes benchmark results, API pricing, context window size and other specifications. For more detailed information, visit the Nemotron 3.5 Lightning (30B A3B) or Seed 2.1 Turbo page. See also the complete list of AI model comparisons.