Which is better for ai & machine learning: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe or NVIDIA L40S?

NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe performs better for ai & machine learning, winning 10 of 12 benchmarks in our suite with an average 16.3% advantage.

What are the main hardware differences between NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe and NVIDIA L40S?

NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe has 80GB VRAM and a 300W TDP, while NVIDIA L40S has 48GB VRAM and a 350W TDP.

Does VRAM matter more than speed between NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe and NVIDIA L40S?

For AI, yes, NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe fits 8 more of our 12 workloads than NVIDIA L40S. A model that exceeds VRAM doesn't run slower, it doesn't run at all, so the card that fits the model wins that workload outright.

Where is the biggest performance difference between NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe and NVIDIA L40S?

Qwen-Image-Edit: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe leads by roughly 45% (1.54 vs 1.06 images/min) in our testing.

NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe vs NVIDIA L40S, AI & Machine Learning Comparison

NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe wins 10 of 12 benchmarks, averaging 16.3% faster.

Both cards were measured first-party on our bench, same suite, same test rig.

What the numbers say

The gap is widest in Qwen-Image-Edit, where NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe leads by 45% (1.54 vs 1.06 images/min); the closest fight is Stable Diffusion XL (1% apart); VRAM decides part of this one: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe runs 152 of our 12 AI workloads while the other card runs 12, models that don't fit score zero.

Benchmark results head-to-head

Benchmark	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe	NVIDIA L40S	Difference
Qwen3 4B tok/s	198.27	212.05	-6%
Llama 3.1 8B tok/s	161.75	135.51	+19%
Qwen2.5-Coder 14B tok/s	88.36	74.6	+18%
Qwen3 32B tok/s	43.77	34.44	+27%
Llama 3.3 70B tok/s	22.89	16.49	+39%
Stable Diffusion XL images/min	16.8	17.02	-1%
Z-Image Turbo images/min	9.3	8.325	+12%
FLUX.1 dev images/min	3.964	3.836	+3%
FLUX.1 Kontext dev images/min	1.843	1.693	+9%
Qwen-Image-Edit images/min	1.54	1.06	+45%
LTX-Video (distilled) frames/s	8.51	8.01	+6%
Wan 2.2 5B (720p) frames/s	0.61	0.49	+24%

Whole-job comparison

How long each card takes to finish a complete pipeline, not just one model. NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe is faster on 9 of 9; NVIDIA L40S on 0.

Workflow	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe	NVIDIA L40S	Difference	Cost per run
24-frame storyboard	3.7 min	4.1 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.11x faster	$0.072 vs $0.053
60-second AI short film	4.6 min	4.9 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.09x faster	$0.090 vs $0.065
6-panel comic page	5.9 min	6.5 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.10x faster	$0.118 vs $0.086
Character sheet, 12 poses	7.7 min	8.4 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.09x faster	$0.152 vs $0.110
Full codebase review	11.3 min	13.5 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.19x faster	$0.224 vs $0.177
10 short social clips	15.7 min	19.1 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.21x faster	$0.311 vs $0.251
20 long-form articles	20.4 min	28.5 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.40x faster	$0.404 vs $0.375
40-product photo shoot	24.8 min	26.7 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.08x faster	$0.491 vs $0.352
100-photo restoration batch	54.7 min	59.6 min	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe 1.09x faster	$1.085 vs $0.784

Renting by the hour, NVIDIA L40S finishes 9 of 9 cheaper. The quicker card is not automatically the cheaper way to get the work done.

Cost to rent

Card	Per hour
NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe	$1.190
NVIDIA L40S	$0.790

NVIDIA L40S is 1.51x cheaper per hour. Cheapest on-demand rate we see across RunPod and Vast.

Specifications compared

	NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe	NVIDIA L40S
VRAM	80GB	48GB
Architecture	Ampere	Ada Lovelace
Memory bandwidth	1935 GB/s	864 GB/s
Boost clock	1,410 MHz	2,520 MHz
TDP	300 W	350 W
Launch MSRP	$15,000	$7,500
Release	2021-06-28	2023-08-08

FAQ

Which is better for ai & machine learning: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe or NVIDIA L40S?: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe performs better for ai & machine learning, winning 10 of 12 benchmarks in our suite with an average 16.3% advantage.
What are the main hardware differences between NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe and NVIDIA L40S?: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe has 80GB VRAM and a 300W TDP, while NVIDIA L40S has 48GB VRAM and a 350W TDP.
Does VRAM matter more than speed between NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe and NVIDIA L40S?: For AI, yes, NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe fits 8 more of our 12 workloads than NVIDIA L40S. A model that exceeds VRAM doesn't run slower, it doesn't run at all, so the card that fits the model wins that workload outright.
Where is the biggest performance difference between NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe and NVIDIA L40S?: Qwen-Image-Edit: NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe leads by roughly 45% (1.54 vs 1.06 images/min) in our testing.

NVIDIA A100 80GB PCIe full review · NVIDIA L40S full review · All AI & Machine Learning rankings