Lambda vs Vast.ai
GPU specialist against peer marketplace, priced against each other on the 5 GPUs both of them rent. Published per-GPU on-demand rates as each provider last stated them, with what their own pages say about billing, commitment and egress beside the numbers.
Vast.ai is cheaper on 5 of the 5 cards both of them rent, by a median of 53%.
- How they sell
- GPU specialist An operator whose whole business is renting these cards.
- GPU models
- 11 26 offers
- Registered in
- 🇺🇸 United States
- How they sell
- Peer marketplace A stranger whose machine the platform vets to some degree. Reliability, bandwidth and how long the machine stays online vary by host, not just by price.
- GPU models
- 21 58 offers
- Registered in
- 🇺🇸 United States
These are not the same product. A GPU specialist and a peer marketplace differ in who your counterparty is, which is why the rates below can be far apart without either being wrong. The prices are comparable; what stands behind them is not.
The 5 cards both of them rent, cheapest published per-GPU on-demand rate each. Dearest first.
| GPU | Lambda | Vast.ai | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| NVIDIA B200 SXM6 180GB | $6.69/hr | $6.25/hr | 7% cheaper on Vast.ai |
| NVIDIA H100 SXM5 80GB | $3.99/hr | $1.87/hr | 53% cheaper on Vast.ai |
| NVIDIA H100 PCIe 80GB | $3.29/hr | $2.47/hr | 25% cheaper on Vast.ai |
| NVIDIA A100 SXM4 80GB | $2.79/hr | $0.67/hr | 76% cheaper on Vast.ai |
| NVIDIA RTX A6000 48GB | $1.09/hr | $0.40/hr | 63% cheaper on Vast.ai |
Per GPU per hour, on-demand list prices as each provider last published them. Rates exclude tax and vary by region; a cheaper rate is not the same machine, the same network or the same support.
| Lambda | Vast.ai | |
|---|---|---|
| Billing granularityOn short jobs this outweighs the rate: an hour minimum on a 90-second run costs more than a 30% dearer per-second rate. | Per minute | Per second |
| Minimum commitment | None on demand; 2 weeks on clusters | $5 minimum to start |
| Payment model | Postpaid, weekly invoices; clusters invoiced on reservation | Prepaid credits; optional auto top-up |
| Egress | Free | Priced per byte by each host |
| Regions | 14 regions: US (9), Japan (2), India, Germany, Israel | 40+ data centres worldwide |
Neither site tells you whether your data trains their models, an uptime SLA, whether you get credits when it breaks or whether a commitment auto-renews. We looked on both and record the absence rather than filling it in — if you need any of it, ask before you commit.
- NVIDIA Quadro RTX 6000 24GB$0.69/hr
- NVIDIA Tesla V100 16GB$0.79/hr
- NVIDIA A10 24GB$1.29/hr
- NVIDIA A100 PCIe 40GB$1.99/hr
- NVIDIA A100 SXM4 40GB$1.99/hr
- NVIDIA GH200 96GB$2.29/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 3090 24GB$0.12/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 4070 12GB$0.14/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 4070 Ti Super 16GB$0.21/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 5080 16GB$0.27/hr
- NVIDIA RTX PRO 4000 Blackwell 24GB$0.27/hr
- NVIDIA RTX PRO 4500 Blackwell 32GB$0.35/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 4090 24GB$0.43/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 5090 32GB$0.47/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 6000 Ada 48GB$0.54/hr
- NVIDIA RTX 4080 Super 16GB$0.64/hr
- NVIDIA A100 PCIe 80GB$0.74/hr
- NVIDIA RTX PRO 5000 Blackwell 48GB$0.79/hr
Is Lambda cheaper than Vast.ai?
Vast.ai is cheaper on 5 of the 5 cards both of them rent, by a median of 53%.
Which GPUs do Lambda and Vast.ai both rent?
NVIDIA B200 SXM6 180GB, NVIDIA H100 SXM5 80GB, NVIDIA H100 PCIe 80GB, NVIDIA A100 SXM4 80GB, NVIDIA RTX A6000 48GB — 5 in total, on published per-GPU on-demand rates.
What is the cheapest GPU at Lambda and at Vast.ai?
Of the cards both rent, Lambda starts at $1.09 per GPU-hour and Vast.ai at $0.40.
Are Lambda and Vast.ai the same kind of provider?
No. Lambda is a GPU specialist — an operator whose whole business is renting these cards. Vast.ai is a peer marketplace — a stranger whose machine the platform vets to some degree. Reliability, bandwidth and how long the machine stays online vary by host, not just by price. The rates are comparable; what stands behind them is not.