Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback) vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
Which is better for the money: Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback) by Anthropic or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning by NVIDIA? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-27.
Depends on your budget
Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback) scores 36.7 points higher (49.6 vs 12.9) but costs 113× as much to run the benchmark ($11161 vs $99.0; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback) when you need intelligence above 12.9, and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning when 12.9 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback) | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 49.6 | 12.9 | −74.0% Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is 74.0% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $11,160.86 | $99.03 | −99.1% Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is 99.1% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 109.02s | 8.23s | −92.5% Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is 92.5% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $10.0 / $50.0 | $0.06 / $0.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Nemotron 3.5 Lightning vs Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback): 74.0% less intelligence, 99.1% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 92.5% faster end-to-end.
Against the frontier
- Claude Fable 5 (Max, Opus 4.8 Fallback) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (Max, Default Fallback) scores 57.60 for $8708.
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Haiku 5.5 (High) scores 37.80 for $94.1.
Compare something else
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-fable-5/nemotron-3-5-lightning · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-fable-5/nemotron-3-5-lightning?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill