Pick Claude Opus 5 for frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — anthropic reports it more than doubling opus 4.8 on frontier-bench v0.1 or agentic coding — within 0.5% of fable 5's peak cursorbench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (anthropic's figures). Pick NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super for high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x gpt-oss-120b) or 1m-token context with strong long-context retrieval (91.6% ruler @ 1m). Choose NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super if you need self-hosting or data privacy; Claude Opus 5 if you want a managed API.
Claude Opus 5 (Anthropic) and NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super (NVIDIA) are two of the models people most often weigh against each other in 2026. Claude Opus 5 is anthropic's July 2026 flagship at $5/$25 with a 1M window and an effort dial — near-frontier quality pitched on cost per task, not raw peak. NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super is nVIDIA's open 120B-total/12B-active hybrid Mamba-Transformer MoE built for high-throughput agentic reasoning at 1M-token context. They diverge most on price and open vs. closed weights — each quantified below from the models' real specs.
Key differences
Cost model: NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super ships open weights you can self-host (hardware cost only, no per-token fee), while Claude Opus 5 is API-metered at $5/$25 per 1M tokens. Your choice depends on whether you want zero marginal cost at the price of running infrastructure.
Context window: both advertise 1M (~1,500 pages). Tie on paper — test on your own long inputs, since usable recall varies by model.
Recency: Claude Opus 5 is the newer model by about 5 months (released July 24, 2026), usually meaning fresher training data and capabilities.
Specifications
Spec
Claude Opus 5
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
Provider
Anthropic (US)
NVIDIA (US)
Released
July 24, 2026
March 11, 2026
Context window
1M (~1,500 pages)
1M (~1,500 pages)
Price (in/out)
$5/$25 per 1M tokens
Open weight (self-host / free)
Open weight?
No — API only
Yes — self-hostable
Modalities
text, image, code
text, code
SWE-Bench Verified
Not published
60.47%
MRCR v2 @ 1M
Not published
Not published
Who wins what
Frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — Anthropic reports it more than doubling Opus 4.8 on Frontier-Bench v0.1: Claude Opus 5 — Anthropic's July 2026 flagship at $5/$25 with a 1M window and an effort dial — near-frontier quality pitched on cost per task, not raw peak — and it is the newer of the two.
Agentic coding — within 0.5% of Fable 5's peak CursorBench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (Anthropic's figures): Claude Opus 5 — Claude Opus 5 lists agentic coding — within 0.5% of Fable 5's peak CursorBench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (Anthropic's figures) among its strengths; NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super does not.
Computer use — surpasses Fable 5's best OSWorld 2.0 result at just over a third of the cost: Claude Opus 5 — Claude Opus 5 lists computer use — surpasses Fable 5's best OSWorld 2.0 result at just over a third of the cost among its strengths; NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super does not.
High-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x GPT-OSS-120B): NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — Claude Opus 5 is comparatively weak here — fast mode's throughput costs double the base price ($10/$50 per 1M)
1M-token context with strong long-context retrieval (91.6% RULER @ 1M): NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — NVIDIA's open 120B-total/12B-active hybrid Mamba-Transformer MoE built for high-throughput agentic reasoning at 1M-token context — and its weights are open while Claude Opus 5 is API-only.
Strong math reasoning (90.21% AIME 2025): NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super lists strong math reasoning (90.21% AIME 2025) among its strengths; Claude Opus 5 does not.
Lowest cost at scale: NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — Its weights are open, so at volume you pay for your own hardware instead of Claude Opus 5's $5/$25 per 1M tokens.
Which should you pick?
A cost-sensitive startup shipping high volume: NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — At Open weight (self-host / free) it undercuts Claude Opus 5, and on millions of tokens that margin decides the monthly bill.
A team with data-privacy or self-hosting needs: NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — Open weights let you run it on your own hardware; Claude Opus 5 is API-only.
Anyone whose priority is frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — anthropic reports it more than doubling opus 4.8 on frontier-bench v0.1: Claude Opus 5 — It is specifically built for that.
Anyone whose priority is high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x gpt-oss-120b): NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super — That is its strongest area.
Claude Opus 5: where it fits
Anthropic's July 2026 flagship at $5/$25 with a 1M window and an effort dial — near-frontier quality pitched on cost per task, not raw peak. Released July 24, 2026 by Anthropic, it is built for frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — Anthropic reports it more than doubling Opus 4.8 on Frontier-Bench v0.1, agentic coding — within 0.5% of Fable 5's peak CursorBench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (Anthropic's figures), computer use — surpasses Fable 5's best OSWorld 2.0 result at just over a third of the cost, and a native effort setting (low, medium, high, xhigh, max) that trades token cost against capability on a single model.
Its trade-offs are real: behind Mythos 5 on cybersecurity exploitation and biology research, by Anthropic's own account, all launch benchmarks are Anthropic-reported and not yet independently reproduced, no published SWE-Bench Verified score, so head-to-head coding comparisons rely on Anthropic's own benchmark suite, and fast mode's throughput costs double the base price ($10/$50 per 1M). At $5 in / $25 out per million tokens, it sits in the premium price band.
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super: where it fits
NVIDIA's open 120B-total/12B-active hybrid Mamba-Transformer MoE built for high-throughput agentic reasoning at 1M-token context. Released March 11, 2026 by NVIDIA, it is built for high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x GPT-OSS-120B), 1M-token context with strong long-context retrieval (91.6% RULER @ 1M), strong math reasoning (90.21% AIME 2025), and fully open weights, datasets, and recipes for self-hosting.
Its trade-offs: text-only; no image, audio, or video input, and requires roughly 8x H100-80GB GPUs to self-host at BF16. As an open-weight model, its running cost is your own hardware rather than a per-token fee.
The bottom line for this matchup
The defining split here is open vs. closed. NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super gives you weights you control — self-host it, fine-tune it, keep data in-house, pay only for hardware. Claude Opus 5 gives you a managed, always-updated API with no infrastructure to run. Teams with GPUs, privacy requirements, or huge volume often favour the open model; teams that want zero ops and the latest capabilities favour the closed one. Capability is close enough that this operational question, not the benchmark, usually decides it.
Frequently asked questions
Is Claude Opus 5 or NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super better for coding?
Public SWE-Bench figures are not available for Claude Opus 5, so the honest test is your own repository — run an identical real bug through both. By design, Claude Opus 5 leans toward frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — anthropic reports it more than doubling opus 4.8 on frontier-bench v0.1 while NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super leans toward high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x gpt-oss-120b), and that positioning usually predicts which feels better on your codebase.
Which is cheaper, Claude Opus 5 or NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super?
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super is open-weight, so self-hosting means no per-token fee (you pay for hardware instead), while Claude Opus 5 is API-metered at $5/$25 per 1M tokens. For most teams without GPUs, the API model is cheaper to start; at very high volume, self-hosting can win.
Which has the bigger context window?
Both advertise 1M (~1,500 pages). Remember advertised ≠ usable: recall typically degrades before the ceiling.
Can I use both Claude Opus 5 and NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super together?
Yes — a multi-model platform like LumiChats gives you Claude Opus 5, NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super and 40+ others under one ₹69/day pass (about $1/day), so you can draft with one and cross-check with the other instead of buying two subscriptions.
Which is newer, Claude Opus 5 or NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super?
Claude Opus 5 — released July 24, 2026, about 5 months after NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super.
Claude Opus 5 vs NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
Anthropic · US | NVIDIA · US · Updated June 2026
Quick verdict
Pick Claude Opus 5 for frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — anthropic reports it more than doubling opus 4.8 on frontier-bench v0.1 or agentic coding — within 0.5% of fable 5's peak cursorbench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (anthropic's figures). Pick NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super for high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x gpt-oss-120b) or 1m-token context with strong long-context retrieval (91.6% ruler @ 1m). Choose NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super if you need self-hosting or data privacy; Claude Opus 5 if you want a managed API.
Claude Opus 5 (Anthropic) and NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super (NVIDIA) are two of the models people most often weigh against each other in 2026. Claude Opus 5 is anthropic's July 2026 flagship at $5/$25 with a 1M window and an effort dial — near-frontier quality pitched on cost per task, not raw peak. NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super is nVIDIA's open 120B-total/12B-active hybrid Mamba-Transformer MoE built for high-throughput agentic reasoning at 1M-token context. They diverge most on price and open vs. closed weights — each quantified below from the models' real specs.
Key differences at a glance
▸Cost model: NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super ships open weights you can self-host (hardware cost only, no per-token fee), while Claude Opus 5 is API-metered at $5/$25 per 1M tokens. Your choice depends on whether you want zero marginal cost at the price of running infrastructure.
▸Context window: both advertise 1M (~1,500 pages). Tie on paper — test on your own long inputs, since usable recall varies by model.
▸Recency: Claude Opus 5 is the newer model by about 5 months (released July 24, 2026), usually meaning fresher training data and capabilities.
Side-by-side specs
Spec
Claude Opus 5
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
Provider
Anthropic (US)
NVIDIA (US)
Released
July 24, 2026
March 11, 2026
Context window
1M (~1,500 pages)
1M (~1,500 pages)
Price (in/out)
$5/$25 per 1M tokens
Open weight (self-host / free)
Open weight?
No — API only
Yes — self-hostable
Modalities
text, image, code
text, code
SWE-Bench Verified
Not published
60.47%
MRCR v2 @ 1M
Not published
Not published
Who wins what
Frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — Anthropic reports it more than doubling Opus 4.8 on Frontier-Bench v0.1
Claude Opus 5
Anthropic's July 2026 flagship at $5/$25 with a 1M window and an effort dial — near-frontier quality pitched on cost per task, not raw peak — and it is the newer of the two.
Agentic coding — within 0.5% of Fable 5's peak CursorBench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (Anthropic's figures)
Claude Opus 5
Claude Opus 5 lists agentic coding — within 0.5% of Fable 5's peak CursorBench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (Anthropic's figures) among its strengths; NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super does not.
Computer use — surpasses Fable 5's best OSWorld 2.0 result at just over a third of the cost
Claude Opus 5
Claude Opus 5 lists computer use — surpasses Fable 5's best OSWorld 2.0 result at just over a third of the cost among its strengths; NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super does not.
High-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x GPT-OSS-120B)
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
Claude Opus 5 is comparatively weak here — fast mode's throughput costs double the base price ($10/$50 per 1M)
1M-token context with strong long-context retrieval (91.6% RULER @ 1M)
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
NVIDIA's open 120B-total/12B-active hybrid Mamba-Transformer MoE built for high-throughput agentic reasoning at 1M-token context — and its weights are open while Claude Opus 5 is API-only.
Strong math reasoning (90.21% AIME 2025)
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super lists strong math reasoning (90.21% AIME 2025) among its strengths; Claude Opus 5 does not.
Lowest cost at scale
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
Its weights are open, so at volume you pay for your own hardware instead of Claude Opus 5's $5/$25 per 1M tokens.
Which should you pick?
A cost-sensitive startup shipping high volume
→ NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
At Open weight (self-host / free) it undercuts Claude Opus 5, and on millions of tokens that margin decides the monthly bill.
A team with data-privacy or self-hosting needs
→ NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
Open weights let you run it on your own hardware; Claude Opus 5 is API-only.
Anyone whose priority is frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — anthropic reports it more than doubling opus 4.8 on frontier-bench v0.1
→ Claude Opus 5
It is specifically built for that.
Anyone whose priority is high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x gpt-oss-120b)
→ NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super
That is its strongest area.
Claude Opus 5: where it fits
Anthropic's July 2026 flagship at $5/$25 with a 1M window and an effort dial — near-frontier quality pitched on cost per task, not raw peak. Released July 24, 2026 by Anthropic, it is built for frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — Anthropic reports it more than doubling Opus 4.8 on Frontier-Bench v0.1, agentic coding — within 0.5% of Fable 5's peak CursorBench 3.2 score at half the cost per task (Anthropic's figures), computer use — surpasses Fable 5's best OSWorld 2.0 result at just over a third of the cost, and a native effort setting (low, medium, high, xhigh, max) that trades token cost against capability on a single model.
Its trade-offs are real: behind Mythos 5 on cybersecurity exploitation and biology research, by Anthropic's own account, all launch benchmarks are Anthropic-reported and not yet independently reproduced, no published SWE-Bench Verified score, so head-to-head coding comparisons rely on Anthropic's own benchmark suite, and fast mode's throughput costs double the base price ($10/$50 per 1M). At $5 in / $25 out per million tokens, it sits in the premium price band.
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super: where it fits
NVIDIA's open 120B-total/12B-active hybrid Mamba-Transformer MoE built for high-throughput agentic reasoning at 1M-token context. Released March 11, 2026 by NVIDIA, it is built for high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x GPT-OSS-120B), 1M-token context with strong long-context retrieval (91.6% RULER @ 1M), strong math reasoning (90.21% AIME 2025), and fully open weights, datasets, and recipes for self-hosting.
Its trade-offs: text-only; no image, audio, or video input, and requires roughly 8x H100-80GB GPUs to self-host at BF16. As an open-weight model, its running cost is your own hardware rather than a per-token fee.
The bottom line for this matchup
The defining split here is open vs. closed. NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super gives you weights you control — self-host it, fine-tune it, keep data in-house, pay only for hardware. Claude Opus 5 gives you a managed, always-updated API with no infrastructure to run. Teams with GPUs, privacy requirements, or huge volume often favour the open model; teams that want zero ops and the latest capabilities favour the closed one. Capability is close enough that this operational question, not the benchmark, usually decides it.
Want both Claude Opus 5 and NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super without two subscriptions? LumiChats gives you these plus 40+ models under one ₹69/day pass (about $1/day) — draft with one, cross-check with the other.
Is Claude Opus 5 or NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super better for coding?
Public SWE-Bench figures are not available for Claude Opus 5, so the honest test is your own repository — run an identical real bug through both. By design, Claude Opus 5 leans toward frontier reasoning at lower cost per task — anthropic reports it more than doubling opus 4.8 on frontier-bench v0.1 while NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super leans toward high-throughput agentic reasoning (up to 2.2x gpt-oss-120b), and that positioning usually predicts which feels better on your codebase.
Which is cheaper, Claude Opus 5 or NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super?
NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super is open-weight, so self-hosting means no per-token fee (you pay for hardware instead), while Claude Opus 5 is API-metered at $5/$25 per 1M tokens. For most teams without GPUs, the API model is cheaper to start; at very high volume, self-hosting can win.
Which has the bigger context window?
Both advertise 1M (~1,500 pages). Remember advertised ≠ usable: recall typically degrades before the ceiling.
Can I use both Claude Opus 5 and NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super together?
Yes — a multi-model platform like LumiChats gives you Claude Opus 5, NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super and 40+ others under one ₹69/day pass (about $1/day), so you can draft with one and cross-check with the other instead of buying two subscriptions.
Which is newer, Claude Opus 5 or NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super?
Claude Opus 5 — released July 24, 2026, about 5 months after NVIDIA Nemotron 3 Super.
Specifications and benchmarks reflect publicly reported figures as of June 2026 and may change as providers release updates. Always verify on your own workload.