RunPod vs Lambda
A comparison of RunPod and Lambda built from values read directly from each provider's own documentation, with the source recorded against every figure.
The short answer
- Pick RunPod if
- Short experiments and bursty inference — per-second billing and a $0.27 entry card mean an idle hour costs nothing and a small job is genuinely small.
- Pick Lambda if
- Renting exactly the instance shape you need — Lambda publishes 1x, 2x, 4x and 8x plans for the same card, so a single H100 is a real product rather than a fraction of a node.
4 sourced criteria separate them:
- H100 SXM, per GPU-hour
- RunPod: $3.49 per hour for H100 SXM 80GB, single card. The PCIe variant is $2.89 and H100 NVL is $3.19.
- Lambda: $4.29 per GPU-hour for H100 SXM 80GB on a single-GPU instance, falling to $3.99 on an 8-GPU node. The PCIe variant is $3.29.
- Cheapest GPU, per hour
- RunPod: $0.27 per hour for an RTX A5000 with 24GB. RTX 3090 is $0.50, RTX 4090 $0.74, L40S $1.09.
- Lambda: $0.69 per GPU-hour for a Quadro RTX 6000 with 24GB; the V100 is $0.79 and the A6000 $1.09.
- Largest GPU offered
- RunPod: 288GB per GPU on B300; B200 at 180GB is $6.79 an hour and H200 at 141GB is $4.59.
- Lambda: 180GB per GPU on B200 SXM6, from $6.69 per GPU-hour on an 8-GPU node to $6.99 on a single GPU.
- Billing granularity
- RunPod: Per second, with per-hour rates shown for comparison. Clusters can be started with no commitment and scaled to 64 GPUs.
- Lambda: By the minute.
Pick the criteria you care about. The chart counts how many of them lean toward each provider — the same read as scanning the bars below, just totalled for the ones you chose.
RunPod 0
Lambda 0
At a glance.
| Criterion | RunPod | Lambda |
|---|---|---|
| GPU | ||
| H100 SXM, per GPU-hour | $3.49 per hour for H100 SXM 80GB, single card. The PCIe variant is $2.89 and H100 NVL is $3.19. | $4.29 per GPU-hour for H100 SXM 80GB on a single-GPU instance, falling to $3.99 on an 8-GPU node. The PCIe variant is $3.29. |
| Cheapest GPU, per hour | $0.27 per hour for an RTX A5000 with 24GB. RTX 3090 is $0.50, RTX 4090 $0.74, L40S $1.09. | $0.69 per GPU-hour for a Quadro RTX 6000 with 24GB; the V100 is $0.79 and the A6000 $1.09. |
| Largest GPU offered | 288GB per GPU on B300; B200 at 180GB is $6.79 an hour and H200 at 141GB is $4.59. | 180GB per GPU on B200 SXM6, from $6.69 per GPU-hour on an 8-GPU node to $6.99 on a single GPU. |
| Billing granularity | Per second, with per-hour rates shown for comparison. Clusters can be started with no commitment and scaled to 64 GPUs. | By the minute. |
Where they differ.
H100 SXM, per GPU-hour
- RunPod
- $3.49 per hour for H100 SXM 80GB, single card. The PCIe variant is $2.89 and H100 NVL is $3.19.
- Lambda
- $4.29 per GPU-hour for H100 SXM 80GB on a single-GPU instance, falling to $3.99 on an 8-GPU node. The PCIe variant is $3.29.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- Pricing — RunPod ↗
“H100 SXM 80 GB VRAM 125 GB RAM 20 vCPUs $ 3.49 /hr [...] H100 PCIe 80 GB VRAM 188 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 2.89 /hr [...] H100 NVL 94 GB VRAM 94 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 3.19 /hr”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
- GPU Cloud — Lambda ↗
“NVIDIA H100 SXM 80 GB 26 225 GiB 2.75 TiB SSD $4.29 NVIDIA H100 PCIe 80 GB 26 225 GiB 1 TiB SSD $3.29 [...] 8x Plan [...] NVIDIA H100 SXM 80 GB 208 2900 GiB 22 TiB SSD $3.99”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Cheapest GPU, per hour
- RunPod
- $0.27 per hour for an RTX A5000 with 24GB. RTX 3090 is $0.50, RTX 4090 $0.74, L40S $1.09.
- Lambda
- $0.69 per GPU-hour for a Quadro RTX 6000 with 24GB; the V100 is $0.79 and the A6000 $1.09.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- Pricing — RunPod ↗
“RTX A5000 24 GB VRAM 25 GB RAM 9 vCPUs $ 0.27 /hr [...] RTX 3090 24 GB VRAM [...] $ 0.5 /hr [...] L40S 48 GB VRAM 94 GB RAM 16 vCPUs $ 1.09 /hr”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
- GPU Cloud — Lambda ↗
“NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 24 GB 14 46 GiB 512 GiB SSD $0.69 [...] NVIDIA Tesla V100 16 GB 88 448 GiB 5.8 TiB SSD $0.79 [...] NVIDIA A6000 48 GB 14 100 GiB 512 GiB SSD $1.09”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Largest GPU offered
288GB per GPU on B300; B200 at 180GB is $6.79 an hour and H200 at 141GB is $4.59.
180GB per GPU on B200 SXM6, from $6.69 per GPU-hour on an 8-GPU node to $6.99 on a single GPU.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- Pricing — RunPod ↗
“B300 288 GB HBM3e 251 GB RAM 32 vCPUs [...] B200 180 GB VRAM 283 GB RAM 28 vCPUs $ 6.79 /hr [...] H200 141 GB VRAM 276 GB RAM 24 vCPUs $ 4.59 /hr”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
- GPU Cloud — Lambda ↗
“NVIDIA B200 SXM6 180 GB 208 2900 GiB 22 TiB SSD $6.69 [...] NVIDIA B200 SXM6 180 GB 26 360 GiB 2.75 TiB SSD $6.99”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
Billing granularity
- RunPod
- Per second, with per-hour rates shown for comparison. Clusters can be started with no commitment and scaled to 64 GPUs.
- Lambda
- By the minute.
Sources (2) →Sources ↓
- Pricing — RunPod ↗
“Per hour Per second [...] GPU clusters in minutes with no commitments. Scale up to 64 GPUs, attach shared storage, and pay only for what you use”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
- GPU Cloud — Lambda ↗
“the minute Transparent pricing with no egress fees”
Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing
When these numbers change, hear about it. Sources are re-checked monthly; a repricing goes out as a short note.
Which should you choose?
Choose RunPod if…
Short experiments and bursty inference — per-second billing and a $0.27 entry card mean an idle hour costs nothing and a small job is genuinely small.
Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved
Choose Lambda if…
Renting exactly the instance shape you need — Lambda publishes 1x, 2x, 4x and 8x plans for the same card, so a single H100 is a real product rather than a fraction of a node.
Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved
Consider something else if…
- RunPod: The catalogue mixes community and secure capacity, so the cheapest quoted rate is not always the tier a production workload should sit on.
- Lambda: Its H100 SXM is the most expensive per GPU-hour in this set at $4.29 single-card, and there is no published reserved discount to bring it down.
Documented by only one.
These criteria are published by one provider and not the other. An absence here means we have not found a source, not that the feature is missing.
Questions this comparison answers.
Should I choose RunPod or Lambda?
Pick RunPod if Short experiments and bursty inference — per-second billing and a $0.27 entry card mean an idle hour costs nothing and a small job is genuinely small.
Pick Lambda if Renting exactly the instance shape you need — Lambda publishes 1x, 2x, 4x and 8x plans for the same card, so a single H100 is a real product rather than a fraction of a node.