# I Compared 5 GPU Clouds for LLM Inference in 2026 — Here's What I Found

> Source: <https://dev.to/qisuancloud/i-compared-5-gpu-clouds-for-llm-inference-in-2026-heres-what-i-found-4884>
> Published: 2026-10-06 09:41:57+00:00

*Researched October 2026. Prices from public pricing pages and third-party trackers.*

Running LLMs in production gets expensive fast. I spent a week comparing GPU cloud providers to find the cheapest way to serve inference workloads. Here are the results.

I looked at five providers that offer on-demand GPU instances suitable for LLM inference:

| Provider | A100 80GB/hr | Notes | 
|---|---|---|
| Vast.ai | ~$1.20 | Marketplace, prices fluctuate | 
| RunPod | ~$1.89 | Secure Cloud pricing | 
| Lambda Labs | ~$1.50 | On-demand | 
| AWS (p4d) | ~$3.20 | On-demand, us-east-1 | 
| GCP (a2-highgpu) | ~$2.90 | On-demand | 

*Prices are approximate, researched October 2026. Always check current pricing.*

For smaller models (7B-13B), a 4090 is often enough and much cheaper:

| Provider | RTX 4090/hr | 
|---|---|
| Vast.ai | ~$0.35 | 
| RunPod | ~$0.69 | 

A 4090 can handle Llama 3 8B inference comfortably. If your model fits, don't overpay for an A100.

I'm building a free tool that recommends the cheapest GPU for your specific workload. Drop a comment with your use case and I'll share early access.

*What's your go-to GPU cloud? Am I missing a cheaper option?*