Skip to content
ModelCap

Head-to-head comparison

Llama Guard 4 12B vs Nemotron 3 Ultra

Llama Guard 4 12B (Meta) and Nemotron 3 Ultra (NVIDIA) compared on the ModelCap Index, API price, context window, provider availability, weight access and every public benchmark board they share. Figures are the same ones shown on the live rankings; nothing here is a hidden score.

Snapshot as of 3 September 2026

As of 3 September 2026, Nemotron 3 Ultra holds the stronger ModelCap Index position (#48 vs #221); Llama Guard 4 12B is 13.3× cheaper per output token ($0.18/1M vs $2.40/1M); and Nemotron 3 Ultra offers the longer context window (262K vs 164K tokens).

Which should you choose?

Choose Llama Guard 4 12B if…

  • API cost matters — $0.18/1M output tokens against $2.40/1M, about 13.3× cheaper.
  • your workload is prompt-heavy — input tokens cost $0.18/1M against $0.60/1M.

Choose Nemotron 3 Ultra if…

  • you want the stronger overall ModelCap Index position — #48 against #221 (51.7 vs 0.0 points).
  • you need the longer context window — 262K tokens against 164K.
  • you want provider choice — 3 listed API providers against 1.
  • you want the more recently listed model — Nemotron 3 Ultra was listed 4 June 2026, Llama Guard 4 12B 30 April 2025.

Llama Guard 4 12B vs Nemotron 3 Ultra: specs, pricing and context

Specification comparison of Llama Guard 4 12B and Nemotron 3 Ultra
FieldLlama Guard 4 12BMetaNemotron 3 UltraNVIDIA
ModelCap Index position#221#48
Index score0.051.7
EvidenceEstimatedMeasured
Input price / 1M tokens$0.18$0.60
Output price / 1M tokens$0.18$2.40
Context window164K tokens262K tokens
Max output tokens16K183K
API providers listed13
Weight accessGated accessRestricted license
Input modalitiesImage, TextText
First listed30 April 20254 June 2026
PublisherMetaNVIDIA

Evidence: publisher corpus prior · leave-one-anchor-out calibrated · 2 public benchmark observations across 2 boards. Prices are the lowest listed API offer per million tokens observed on the OpenRouter catalogue.

Benchmark scores: Llama Guard 4 12B vs Nemotron 3 Ultra

Public benchmark boards where Llama Guard 4 12B or Nemotron 3 Ultra has a published result
BoardLlama Guard 4 12BNemotron 3 UltraLeads
LMArena AgentLMArena—-13.6%-16.1%–-11.0%Only one result
AA Intelligence IndexArtificial Analysis—38.3intelligence-indexOnly one result
AA Terminal-Bench 2.1Artificial Analysis—53.9%terminal-bench-2.1Only one result
AA τ²-Bench TelecomArtificial Analysis—83.3%tau2-bench-telecomOnly one result
AA Humanity's Last ExamArtificial Analysis—28.4%humanitys-last-examOnly one result

Scores are the sources' own published figures for each model's best evaluated configuration; ModelCap never re-runs a benchmark.

Want a different pairing? Open the interactive comparison tool to swap either model for any current ranked language model.

Llama Guard 4 12B vs Nemotron 3 Ultra: common questions

Is Llama Guard 4 12B better than Nemotron 3 Ultra?

Nemotron 3 Ultra ranks higher on the ModelCap Index as of 3 September 2026: #48 against #221. That is a capability ranking built from public benchmark evidence with published uncertainty; whether it is "better" for you also depends on price, context and where you can run it.

Is Llama Guard 4 12B cheaper than Nemotron 3 Ultra?

Llama Guard 4 12B is cheaper on output tokens: $0.18/1M against $2.40/1M. Input tokens are $0.18/1M for Llama Guard 4 12B and $0.60/1M for Nemotron 3 Ultra. Prices are the lowest listed API offer ModelCap observed, in USD per million tokens.

Which has the bigger context window, Llama Guard 4 12B or Nemotron 3 Ultra?

Nemotron 3 Ultra has the larger context window: 262K tokens against 164K.

Which is better for coding, Llama Guard 4 12B or Nemotron 3 Ultra?

The two models do not share a coding benchmark board on ModelCap yet, so no head-to-head coding score is published; the ModelCap Index position is the closest overall signal.

Are Llama Guard 4 12B and Nemotron 3 Ultra open-weight models?

Llama Guard 4 12B: Gated access. Nemotron 3 Ultra: Restricted license. Open weights mean the checkpoint can be downloaded and self-hosted under its licence; API-only models are available solely through hosted endpoints.

Where can I run Llama Guard 4 12B and Nemotron 3 Ultra?

ModelCap currently lists 1 API provider for Llama Guard 4 12B and 3 for Nemotron 3 Ultra, from the OpenRouter catalogue snapshot the site serves; each model page lists the providers and their prices.

How current is this Llama Guard 4 12B vs Nemotron 3 Ultra comparison?

Every figure comes from the sealed ModelCap dataset published 3 September 2026; the page re-renders within a minute of each data refresh, and the ModelCap Index positions are the same ones shown on the live rankings.

Explore further