Llama 4 405B vs Sonar Large
A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.
Updated
Llama 4 405B specs · Sonar Large specs- PriceSonar Large
Sonar Large publishes pricing ($1.00 / 1M output tokens) while Llama 4 405B does not.
- Context windowLlama 4 405B
Llama 4 405B accepts 256K tokens vs 127K, 2.0× the room for long documents and codebases.
- BenchmarksTie
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores.
- ModalitiesLlama 4 405B
Llama 4 405B supports 2 modalities (text, vision) vs 1 for Sonar Large.
- OpennessLlama 4 405B
Llama 4 405B ships open weights (Llama 4 Community License); Sonar Large is API-only.
On balance Llama 4 405B edges ahead, winning 3 of 5 categories against Sonar Large's 1. Sonar Large publishes pricing ($1.00 / 1M output tokens) while Llama 4 405B does not. Llama 4 405B accepts 256K tokens vs 127K, 2.0× the room for long documents and codebases.
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores. They differ in modality coverage, Llama 4 405B handles text, vision while Sonar Large handles text, which can be the deciding factor before you even look at benchmarks. Llama 4 405B ships open weights (Llama 4 Community License); Sonar Large is API-only.
Llama 4 405B is the newer of the two, released 5 months after Sonar Large, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. Llama 4 405B is usually picked for open source llm and fine tuning workloads, while Sonar Large sees more deployments in research agent and rag. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.
Side-by-side specs
| Spec | Llama 4 405B | Sonar Large |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Meta | Perplexity |
| Released | Apr 2025 | Nov 2024 |
| Modalities | text, vision | text |
| Context window | 256K tokens | 127K tokens |
| Max output | , | , |
| Input · 1M | Pricing not published | $1.00 / 1M tokens |
| Output · 1M | Pricing not published | $1.00 / 1M tokens |
| Knowledge cutoff | 2024-12 | , |
| Open weights | Yes (Llama 4 Community License) | No |
| API available | Yes | Yes |
Pricing at scale
What you'd actually pay at typical workloads. Numbers come from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day, vs $4.50
- Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day, vs $45.00
- RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day, vs $156
Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates).
Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Llama 4 405BPricing unavailable
- Sonar Large$0.150
Benchmarks compared
Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.
Llama 4 405B fits when…
- Strongest open-weight model at launch
- Multimodal (text + vision)
- Wide hosting availability
- Long-context tasks, handles 256K tokens vs 127K for Sonar Large.
- Self-hosting and on-prem requirements, open weights (Llama 4 Community License).
Sonar Large fits when…
- Web-search grounded
- Citation-first output
- Cheap
Consider Llama 4 70B
Meta's mid-tier Llama 4, the practical workhorse for self-hosted deployments.
Frequently asked
Is Llama 4 405B or Sonar Large cheaper?
Per-token pricing isn't published for at least one of these models, check each model's spec page for current rates.Which has the larger context window?
Llama 4 405B accepts 256K tokens vs 127K for Sonar Large.Is Llama 4 405B or Sonar Large better for coding?
Both Llama 4 405B and Sonar Large are competitive on coding benchmarks. See each model's individual spec page for HumanEval and SWE-bench scores where published. For an opinionated pick, consult our Best LLM for Coding ranking.Are either of these models open source?
Llama 4 405B ships open weights (Llama 4 Community License). Sonar Large is API-only.When were Llama 4 405B and Sonar Large released?
Llama 4 405B was released by Meta on 2025-04-05. Sonar Large was released by Perplexity on 2024-11-19.
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