Llama 3.1 405B Instruct vs Llama 4 Maverick (17B-128E): the real cost to run each

The honest, $0-markup cost to run Llama 3.1 405B Instruct (Meta, 405B) and Llama 4 Maverick (17B-128E) (Meta, 402B), side by side — free on your own machine, on your own rented GPU at the vendor's price, or via your own API key.

Llama 3.1 405B Instruct vs Llama 4 Maverick (17B-128E) — cost comparison

Llama 3.1 405B InstructLlama 4 Maverick (17B-128E)
Parameters405B402B
Context window131.1K1M
LicenseCommercial OKCommercial OK
VRAM to run~290 GB (Q4_K_M)~274 GB (Q4_K_M)
Rent a GPU$3.43/hr$3.43/hr
Your API key$0.80/1M (last-known)$0.38/1M

Which should you pick?

VRAM, size, context and license are facts from the catalog and the shared cost engine; API prices are real where we have them (labeled "est." otherwise). We don't rank model quality or quote benchmarks here.

Full cost breakdown: Llama 3.1 405B Instruct →
Full cost breakdown: Llama 4 Maverick (17B-128E) →

Open the free Spanvero advisor → to compare them live for your exact workload and hardware.

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