Choose AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 if…
No advantage on the data we track — pick it for provider preference or output quality on your own prompts.
AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 vs PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B
PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B comes out ahead on the data we track: 7 advantages and none for AI21: Jamba Large 1.7.
Key numbers
| Spec | AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | AI21 | Prism ML |
| Input price (per 1M tokens) | $2.00 | $0.08 |
| Output price (per 1M tokens) | $8.00 | $0.13 |
| Blended price (3:1 input/output) | $3.50 | $0.09 |
| Cheaper than … of all models we track | 17% | 82% |
| Context window | 256K tokens (~384 pages) | 262K tokens (~393 pages) |
| Larger context than … of all models | 44% | 47% |
| Max output per response | 4K tokens (~3,100 words) | 66K tokens (~49,200 words) |
| Input types | text | text, image |
| Output types | text | text |
| Free variant | No | No |
| Listed since | 2025-08-08 | 2026-10-16 |
Advertisement
What it costs for real workloads
Monthly cost at list price for five common workloads. Token counts per unit are stated so you can scale them to your own traffic. A workload that does not fit a model's context window is marked rather than priced.
| Workload (per month) | AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Customer-support chatbot 50,000 conversations — each a 6-turn conversation (1,500 in / 400 out tokens) | $310 | $8.60 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B saves $301 |
| RAG search over documents 20,000 questions — each a question answered from ~8 retrieved passages (6,000 in / 500 out tokens) | $320 | $10.90 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B saves $309 |
| Coding / tool-using agent 2,000 tasks — each a multi-step task with tool calls and file context (60,000 in / 6,000 out tokens) | $336 | $11.16 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B saves $325 |
| Batch summarisation 10,000 documents — each a 6,000-word report summarised to a page (8,000 in / 600 out tokens) | $208 | $7.18 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B saves $201 |
| Long-document analysis 500 documents — each a 150-page contract or codebase read in one pass (100,000 in / 2,000 out tokens) | $108 | $4.13 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B saves $104 |
Capabilities side by side
| Capability | AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 | PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B | What it lets you do |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tool / function calling | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | call your APIs and run agent loops |
| Structured output (JSON schema) | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | return JSON that validates against your schema |
| Reasoning / thinking mode | — | ✓ Yes | spend extra tokens thinking before answering hard problems |
| Image input | — | ✓ Yes | read screenshots, charts and scanned pages |
| Audio input | — | — | take speech or audio directly |
| File / PDF input | — | — | accept documents without your own parsing step |
| Image output | — | — | generate images, not just text |
| Built-in web search | — | — | answer from live web results |
| Seed (reproducible sampling) | — | ✓ Yes | repeat a generation for tests and evals |
| Log-probabilities | — | ✓ Yes | read token confidence for classification and scoring |
From each model's published parameters and input/output types. “—” means not advertised, not proven absent.
Price history
- AI21: Jamba Large 1.7: price unchanged since we started tracking it on 2026-03-10.
- PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B: price unchanged since we started tracking it on 2026-10-28.
Which should you choose?
Choose PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B if…
- cost matters at scale — it is 97% cheaper on a typical 3:1 input/output mix ($8.60 vs $310 a month for 50,000 support chats)
- you need reasoning / thinking mode — to spend extra tokens thinking before answering hard problems; AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 does not advertise it
- you need image input — to read screenshots, charts and scanned pages; AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 does not advertise it
- you need seed (reproducible sampling) — to repeat a generation for tests and evals; AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 does not advertise it
- you need log-probabilities — to read token confidence for classification and scoring; AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 does not advertise it
- you generate long outputs in one go — up to 66K tokens (about 49,200 words) per response
- you want the newer model — released 2026-10-16, 14 months after the other
Frequently asked questions
Is AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 better than PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B?
PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B comes out ahead on the data we track: 7 advantages and none for AI21: Jamba Large 1.7.
Which is cheaper, AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 or PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B?
PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B is cheaper: $0.09 vs $3.50 per 1M tokens at a typical 3:1 input/output mix, 97% less. For 50,000 support conversations a month that is $8.60 against $310.
How much do AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 and PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B cost per million tokens?
AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 costs $2.00 per 1M input tokens and $8.00 per 1M output tokens; PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B costs $0.08 input and $0.13 output. Output tokens are billed separately, so long answers shift the gap.
Which has the bigger context window, AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 or PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B?
PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B: 262K tokens, about 393 pages, against 256K (about 384 pages) for AI21: Jamba Large 1.7.
Do AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 and PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B support function calling and JSON output?
Tool calling — AI21: Jamba Large 1.7: yes, PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B: yes. JSON-schema structured output — AI21: Jamba Large 1.7: yes, PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B: yes.
Can AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 or PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B read images?
Only PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B accepts image input; AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 is text-only for input.
Is AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 or PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B free to use?
No free variant is listed for either; both are pay-per-token.
What is the maximum output length of AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 and PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B?
AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 can write up to 4K tokens (about 3,100 words) per response; PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B up to 66K (about 49,200 words).
When were AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 and PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B released?
AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 was listed on 2025-08-08; PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B on 2026-10-16.
About the two models
AI21: Jamba Large 1.7
Jamba Large 1.7 is the latest model in the Jamba open family, offering improvements in grounding, instruction-following, and overall efficiency. Built on a hybrid SSM-Transformer architecture with a 256K context...
Full AI21: Jamba Large 1.7 specs →PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B
Ternary Bonsai 2 9B is PrismML’s compact, open-weight language model for conversational AI, reasoning, and tool use. Built on Qwen3.5, it uses ternary weights packed into 2 bits for efficient...
Full PrismML: Ternary Bonsai 2 9B specs →