Mistral Large 3 2512 vs Mistral Small 3

Pick up to 3 models · pricing, context and capabilities · simulate your product cost

Data updated on September 30, 2026· 217 models

Mistral3 2512

Mistral Large 3 2512 is Mistral’s most capable model to date, featuring a sparse mixture-of-experts architecture with 41B active parameters (675B total), and released under the Apache 2.0 license.

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Reasoning estimated
▲
Speed estimated
Input
Output
Context
▲262 K tokens
Max output
▲210 K
Input, $ per 1M tokens
$0.500
Output, $ per 1M tokens
$1.50
Cache read, $ per 1M
$0.050
Batch (input / output)
$0.250 / $0.750
Tool calling
Yes
Released
▲12/02/2025
Knowledge cutoff
2024-11
API id
mistralai/mistral-large-2512
MistralSmall 3

Mistral Small 3 is a 24B-parameter language model optimized for low-latency performance across common AI tasks.

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Reasoning estimated
Speed estimated
▲
Input
Output
Context
33 K tokens
Max output
16 K
Input, $ per 1M tokens
▲$0.050
Output, $ per 1M tokens
▲$0.080
Cache read, $ per 1M
—
Batch (input / output)
—
Tool calling
No
Released
01/30/2025
Knowledge cutoff
—
API id
mistralai/mistral-small-24b-instruct-2501
Third model (optional)
text image audio video PDF / file reasoning (1 to 5, estimated by family) speed (1 to 4, estimated by family)▲ best value among the selected

Which is the better API choice: Mistral Large 3 2512 vs Mistral Small 3?

  • Mistral Small 3: cheapest input (90% less than Mistral Large 3 2512)
  • Mistral Small 3: cheapest output
  • Mistral Large 3 2512: largest context (262 K)
  • Mistral Large 3 2512: the newest (12/02/2025)
  • Mistral Large 3 2512: most reasoning (estimated)
  • Mistral Small 3: the fastest (estimated)

Mistral Small 3 costs 90% less on input and 95% less on output than Mistral Large 3 2512 ($0.050 / $0.080 versus $0.500 / $1.50 per million tokens). Mistral Large 3 2512 accepts more context (262 K). On capabilities, Mistral Large 3 2512 accepts images. Mistral Large 3 2512 offers a batch tier at half price for jobs that do not need an immediate answer.

What would your product cost?

Estimate the monthly cost with your app's real volume. List prices, no cache or batch discounts.

Mistral Large 3 2512
$13.50/mo
Mistral Small 3
$1.07/mo

With Mistral Small 3 you save $12.43 a month versus Mistral Large 3 2512 (92% less).

The 6 cheapest for this scenario (chat, last 12 months)

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  3. 3Qwen3.7 Flash Qwen$0.97
  4. 4DeepSeek V4 Flash 0731 DeepSeek$1.55
  5. 5Ministral 3 3B 2512 Mistral$1.90
  6. 6Qwen3.5-Flash Qwen$2.02

Paste your prompt: tokens and cost per model

Rough estimate (about 4 characters per token). Nothing is sent to any server.

76tokens approx.287 characters

Cost of sending it 1,000 times (input only)

  1. 1Mistral Small 3 Mistral$0.004
  2. 2Mistral Large 3 2512 Mistral$0.038
  3. 3Claude Sonnet 5.5 Anthropic$0.152
  4. 4Claude Sonnet 5 Anthropic$0.152
  5. 5Claude Opus 5.5 Anthropic$0.304
  6. 6Claude Opus 5 Anthropic$0.380
  7. 7Claude Fable 5.1 Anthropic$0.760
  8. 8Claude Fable 5 Anthropic$0.760

Popular comparisons

Frequently asked questions

Which is the better API choice: Mistral Large 3 2512 vs Mistral Small 3?

Mistral Small 3 costs 90% less on input and 95% less on output than Mistral Large 3 2512 ($0.050 / $0.080 versus $0.500 / $1.50 per million tokens). Mistral Large 3 2512 accepts more context (262 K). On capabilities, Mistral Large 3 2512 accepts images. Mistral Large 3 2512 offers a batch tier at half price for jobs that do not need an immediate answer.

Which is cheaper: Mistral Large 3 2512 and Mistral Small 3?

Mistral Small 3 is cheaper: $0.050 per million input tokens and $0.080 per million output tokens, versus $0.500 / $1.50 for Mistral Large 3 2512.

Which has more context: Mistral Large 3 2512 and Mistral Small 3?

Mistral Large 3 2512 accepts 262 K tokens of context; Mistral Small 3 accepts 33 K.

Which is newer: Mistral Large 3 2512 and Mistral Small 3?

Mistral Large 3 2512 was released on 12/02/2025; Mistral Small 3 on 01/30/2025.

What would 10,000 requests a month cost with Mistral Large 3 2512 and Mistral Small 3?

With 1,500 input and 400 output tokens per request: Mistral Large 3 2512: $13.50; Mistral Small 3: $1.07 a month, at list price.

Where do the prices come from and how often are they updated?

From the public catalogs of OpenRouter, models.dev and LiteLLM, which publish each provider's list prices. They sync once a day and the last update date is shown above the comparison.

What does price per million tokens mean?

It is what the provider charges per million tokens you send (input) or the model generates (output). A token is roughly 4 characters. Output almost always costs more than input.

Sources: OpenRouter, models.dev and LiteLLM. Prices in USD per million tokens, list price, no volume discounts. Prompt tokens are an estimate; each provider's tokenizer may differ.