Compare / LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking vs Llama 3.2 1B
LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking vs Llama 3.2 1B
Updated November 2026
Verdict
LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking scores higher on the Small LM Index: 34.7 vs 8.7. On the 8 benchmarks both labs report, LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking wins 7 and Llama 3.2 1B wins 1. Both need about 1.5 GB of memory at 4-bit quantization. Only Llama 3.2 1B has a hosted API on OpenRouter ($0.071 per million tokens); the other has to be self-hosted.
Pick LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking if…
- you want the strongest model overall
- you need math and reasoning
- you need precise instruction following
- you build agents that call tools
Pick Llama 3.2 1B if…
- you want a hosted API rather than running it yourself
- you work with long documents
- you want the more widely used model (more quantized builds and community support)
Specifications
| LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking | Llama 3.2 1B | |
|---|---|---|
| Small LM Index | 34.7 (likely 32–38) | 8.7 (likely 8–9) |
| Lab | Liquid AI · United States | Meta · United States |
| Released | 2026-01-20 | 2024-09-25 |
| Parameters | 1.2B (dense) | 1.2B (dense) |
| Memory at 4-bit | ~1.3 GB | ~1.5 GB |
| Context window | 32K tokens | 128K tokens |
| Input | text | text |
| Reasoning | Always thinks | No thinking |
| License | LFM Open License | Llama 3.2 Community |
| API price / 1M tokens | Self-host only | $0.071 ($0.027 in, $0.20 out) |
| Hugging Face downloads (30 days) | 8.3K | 1.8M |
Benchmarks
Higher is better. Bold marks the winner where both labs report a score. ≈ marks the index model's estimate for a score that wasn't reported, ✓ an independent measurement and * a score measured by another lab.
| Benchmark | LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking | Llama 3.2 1B |
|---|---|---|
| MMLU-Pro Knowledge | 49.7 | 20.0✓ |
| GPQA Diamond Knowledge | 33.9✓ | 19.6✓ |
| Humanity's Last Exam Reasoning | 6.2✓ | 5.5✓ |
| AIME Math | 31.7 | 0.0✓ |
| LiveCodeBench Coding | ≈ 28 | 1.9✓ |
| τ²-Bench Agentic | 19.6✓ | 0.0✓ |
| IFBench Instruction following | 41.8✓ | 22.8✓ |
| IFEval Instruction following | 88.4 | — |
| BFCL Agentic | 57.0 | — |
| MATH-500 Math | 88.0 | 14.0✓ |
| AA-LCR Long context | 0.0✓ | 6.7✓ |
Scores are mostly reported by each lab with its own settings, so small gaps are noise. See the methodology. Open in the interactive comparison to add more models.
Questions
Which is better, LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking or Llama 3.2 1B?
LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking scores higher on the Small LM Index: 34.7 vs 8.7. On the 8 benchmarks both labs report, LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking wins 7 and Llama 3.2 1B wins 1.
Which is cheaper to run?
Only Llama 3.2 1B has a hosted API on OpenRouter ($0.071 per million tokens); the other has to be self-hosted. Both need about 1.5 GB of memory at 4-bit quantization.
Which has the longer context window?
Llama 3.2 1B has the longer context window: 128K tokens against 32K.
Can I use LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking and Llama 3.2 1B commercially?
LFM2.5 1.2B Thinking is released under LFM Open License and Llama 3.2 1B under Llama 3.2 Community. Apache 2.0 and MIT allow commercial use; other licenses can add conditions, so read the license before shipping a product.
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