# MiniMax H3 Lite

> MiniMax H3 Lite is the lightweight, lower-cost variant of the MiniMax H3 family; MiniMax positions it for trying ideas and generating in bulk. It uses the same API as MiniMax H3 and outputs 480P or 768P, not 2K.

Canonical: https://routemux.com/minimax/minimax-h3-lite
Provider: MiniMax

## Key facts

| Field | Value |
| --- | --- |
| Model ID | minimax/minimax-h3-lite |
| Official model ID | MiniMax-H3-Lite |
| Input modalities | text, image |
| Output modalities | video |
| Capabilities | Video, Text To Video, Image To Video, Reference Audio, Reference Image, Reference Video, First Last Frame |
| Upstream release | 2026-10-26 |
| Availability | available |

## Pricing

- RouteMux: $0.0125 per second (from — tiered by duration/resolution)
- Official: $0.025 per second
  - 480P: $0.0125 per second (official $0.025)
  - 768P: $0.02 per second (official $0.04)
- Saving vs official: 50%

Billing is prepaid wallet, charged per successful request only.

## API access

Base URL: https://api.routemux.com

Supported protocols:

- openai_sora

## What is MiniMax H3 Lite

MiniMax H3 Lite is the lightweight, lower-cost variant of the MiniMax H3 family; MiniMax positions it for trying ideas and generating in bulk. It uses the same API as MiniMax H3 and outputs 480P or 768P, not 2K.

You start the same ways as with H3: from a prompt alone (text-to-video), from a first frame or a first and last frame (image-to-video), or from references: up to nine reference images, three reference videos and three reference audio clips (videos and audio each 2–15 seconds per clip, 15 seconds in total). Frame images and references cannot be mixed in one request, and a request takes at most 12 input files. Duration is any whole number of seconds from 4 to 15, and the aspect ratio can be 16:9, 9:16, 1:1, 4:3, 3:4 or 21:9. Prompts can run to 7,000 characters.

One thing works differently from H3: with reference inputs (images, video or audio) you must pass an explicit ratio. Adaptive is not supported there, and leaving the ratio out returns a 400 before any job is created. With only a first frame, or first and last frames, the ratio follows the input image as usual.

Pricing is per output second, with one rate for 480P and another for 768P. Reference video adds a charge per input second at the rate of the chosen output tier; the first five reference images are free and each one after that is charged; reference audio is free. It uses the OpenAI Sora protocol and is asynchronous: the request returns a job, and you poll it for the finished video.

## Key capabilities

- **480P or 768P** — Two output resolutions, each with its own per-second rate.
- **4–15 seconds** — Any whole-second length, not fixed presets.
- **Frames or references** — First frame, first + last frame, or up to 9 reference images, 3 reference videos and 3 audio clips.
- **Asynchronous** — Returns a job; poll it to get the video.
- **50% below official pricing** — Billed per output second; both per-second rates are in the pricing section above.

## Other variants in this family

- MiniMax H3 (`minimax/minimax-h3`)
- MiniMax H3 Highspeed (`minimax/minimax-h3-highspeed`)
- MiniMax H3 Max (`minimax/minimax-h3-max`)

## Sources

- [MiniMax — Video generation v2 API](https://platform.minimax.io/docs/api-reference/video-generation-v2-create)
- [MiniMax — Pay-as-you-go pricing](https://platform.minimax.io/docs/guides/pricing-paygo)

_Content reviewed by the RouteMux team on 2026-10-26._