Llama 3.1 405B vs BGE Large v1.5

Compare Llama 3.1 405B and BGE Large v1.5: pricing, performance, context window, latency, and best use cases. Side-by-side comparison on XALEN.

Updated 2026-05-21 · By Abhishek Raj · Our methodology

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Feature Llama 3.1 405B BGE Large v1.5
CategoryOpen SourceEmbedding
Parameters405B326M
Context Window128K512
Input Price$0.08/1M tokens$0.001/1M tokens
Output Price$0.14/1M tokensN/A/1M tokens
Latency~600ms~15ms

Choose Llama 3.1 405B when:

  • ✓ Premium tasks
  • ✓ Research
  • ✓ Fine-tuning base
Key Strengths:

Largest open model, Highest open-source quality

Choose BGE Large v1.5 when:

  • ✓ Budget RAG
  • ✓ Knowledge bases
  • ✓ Document clustering
Key Strengths:

Very low cost, Good multilingual, Fast

Verdict: Llama 3.1 405B vs BGE Large v1.5

For cost efficiency, BGE Large v1.5 wins at $0.001/1M input tokens. For speed, BGE Large v1.5 is faster at ~15ms. Llama 3.1 405B excels at Premium tasks while BGE Large v1.5 is better for Budget RAG. Both are available on XALEN through a single API — try them in the Playground to see which fits your workload.

Detailed Analysis

Pricing Comparison

Llama 3.1 405B costs $0.08/1M input tokens and $0.14/1M output tokens. BGE Large v1.5 costs $0.001 input and N/A output. BGE Large v1.5 is 80.0x cheaper on input tokens. XALEN offers batch processing at 50% discount on both models.

Performance & Context

Llama 3.1 405B has a 128K context window with ~600ms latency. BGE Large v1.5 offers 512 context at ~15ms. Llama 3.1 405B has the larger context window.

Best For

Llama 3.1 405B (Open Source) is optimized for: Premium tasks, Research, Fine-tuning base. BGE Large v1.5 (Embedding) works best for: Budget RAG, Knowledge bases, Document clustering.

Try Both on XALEN

Both models are available through XALEN's OpenAI-compatible API. Switch between them by changing the model parameter:

from xalen import XALEN

client = XALEN(api_key="xln_test_YOUR_KEY")

# Use Llama 3.1 405B
response_a = client.chat.completions.create(
    model="llama-3-1-405b",
    messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Your question here"}]
)

# Use BGE Large v1.5
response_b = client.chat.completions.create(
    model="bge-large-v1-5",
    messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Your question here"}]
)

Start Building with XALEN

200+ AI models. One API. Pay-as-you-go.

Get API Key Try in Playground

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, Llama 3.1 405B or BGE Large v1.5?

Llama 3.1 405B (Open Source, 405B) offers Largest open model. BGE Large v1.5 (Embedding, 326M) offers Very low cost. Choose Llama 3.1 405B for Premium tasks or BGE Large v1.5 for Budget RAG.

How much does Llama 3.1 405B cost vs BGE Large v1.5?

Llama 3.1 405B: $0.08/1M input, $0.14/1M output. BGE Large v1.5: $0.001/1M input, N/A/1M output. Both available on XALEN with batch processing at 50% discount.

Can I use both models on XALEN?

Yes. XALEN provides 200+ models through a single OpenAI-compatible API. Switch between Llama 3.1 405B and BGE Large v1.5 by changing the model parameter. No code changes needed.

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Last updated: 2026-05-21. Pricing and specifications may change. Check pricing page for latest rates.