Yi-Lightning
01.AI's late-2024 flagship that briefly topped Chinese models on the LMSYS arena.
About
Launched October 16, 2024, Yi-Lightning was 01.AI's flagship model under Kai-Fu Lee, debuting at 6th overall on the LMSYS Chatbot Arena and first among Chinese models, with strong showings in Chinese, math, coding, and hard prompts. 01.AI emphasized inference efficiency: roughly half the first-token latency of Yi-Large and nearly 40% faster generation, priced at $0.99 per million tokens.
Limitations: API-only with no open weights; LMSYS rankings were a single point in time and 01.AI has since pivoted toward enterprise solutions in China.
Specs
Context window
Pricing
Free quota
API access
Weights
Released
Benchmarks
Provider-reported unless a source says otherwise. Benchmarks are marketing-adjacent by nature — treat them as directional.
Use cases
Trust score — 8/10
Scored 8/10 (verified tier, metrics-v1). Evidence: Verified via vendor site/docs/GitHub and reputable coverage, wave 67; Trending score 78/100 from researcher assessment.