Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3) vs Runway
Which one should you pick? Here's the full breakdown.
Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3)
Tencent's Hy3 Preview launched 2026-04-23 -- 295B total / 21B active MoE, 256K context, open-sourced on HuggingFace under tencent/Hy3-preview. Cheapest frontier-class API at ~1.2 RMB per million input tokens. Integrated into Yuanbao, WeChat, QQ
Runway
Runway Gen-4.5 (shipped 2025-12-01) -- #1 on Artificial Analysis text-to-video leaderboard at 1,247 Elo. Gen-4 Turbo supports native 4K. The most capable professional AI video generator available in 2026
| Category | Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3) | Runway |
|---|---|---|
| Ease of Use | 7.0 | 7.0 |
| Output Quality | 8.0 | 9.0 |
| Value | 9.5 | 6.0 |
| Features | 8.0 | 9.0 |
| Overall | 8.1 | 7.8 |
Pricing Comparison
| Feature | Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3) | Runway |
|---|---|---|
| Free Tier | Yes | Yes |
| Starting Price | $0 | $0 |
Which Should You Pick?
Pick Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3) if...
- ✓Better value for money (9.5/10)
Chinese-market builders, multilingual products that need strong CN performance, and cost-sensitive developers who want frontier-class quality at sub-DeepSeek pricing. Also anyone watching the open-weights field who wants Tencent's distribution-backed entry on the bench.
Visit Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3)Pick Runway if...
- ✓Higher output quality (9 vs 8)
- ✓More features (9 vs 8)
Video creators, filmmakers, and agencies who need top AI video quality with the full creative suite (inpainting, motion brush, video-to-video). Gen-4.5 at #1 on the Artificial Analysis leaderboard makes it the benchmark pick for professional work in 2026.
Visit RunwayOur Verdict
Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3) and Runway are extremely close overall. Your choice comes down to specific needs -- Hunyuan 3 (Tencent Hy3) is better for chinese-market builders, multilingual products that need strong cn performance, and cost-sensitive developers who want frontier-class quality at sub-deepseek pricing, while Runway works best for video creators, filmmakers, and agencies who need top ai video quality with the full creative suite (inpainting, motion brush, video-to-video).