Codestral 2 vs Mistral Small
A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.
Updated
Codestral 2 specs · Mistral Small specs- PriceMistral Small
Mistral Small is roughly 1.5× cheaper on output tokens ($0.60 vs $0.90 per 1M).
- Context windowCodestral 2
Codestral 2 accepts 256K tokens vs 128K, 2.0× the room for long documents and codebases.
- BenchmarksTie
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores.
- ModalitiesTie
Both handle text.
- OpennessTie
Both ship open weights, self-host either one.
It's a genuine coin-flip between Codestral 2 and Mistral Small: 1 category wins each, with the rest tied. Mistral Small is roughly 1.5× cheaper on output tokens ($0.60 vs $0.90 per 1M). Codestral 2 accepts 256K tokens vs 128K, 2.0× the room for long documents and codebases.
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores. Both target the same set of modalities (text), so the deciding factors are price, context, and raw quality. Both ship open weights, self-host either one.
Codestral 2 is the newer of the two, released 4 months after Mistral Small, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. Codestral 2 is usually picked for code completion and coding llm workloads, while Mistral Small sees more deployments in cheapest llm and fastest llm. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.
Side-by-side specs
| Spec | Codestral 2 | Mistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral | Mistral |
| Released | Jan 2025 | Sep 2024 |
| Modalities | text | text |
| Context window | 256K tokens | 128K tokens |
| Max output | , | , |
| Input · 1M | $0.30 / 1M tokens | $0.20 / 1M tokens |
| Output · 1M | $0.90 / 1M tokens | $0.60 / 1M tokens |
| Knowledge cutoff | , | , |
| Open weights | Yes (Mistral Non-Production License) | Yes (Apache-2.0) |
| API available | Yes | Yes |
Pricing at scale
What you'd actually pay at typical workloads. Numbers come from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day$2.25 vs $1.50
- Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day$22.50 vs $15.00
- RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day$50.40 vs $33.60
Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: $2.25 vs $1.50 per month, model B comes out ahead. Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: $22.50 vs $15.00 per month, model B comes out ahead. RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: $50.40 vs $33.60 per month, model B comes out ahead.
Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Codestral 2$0.075
- Mistral Small$0.050
Benchmarks compared
Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.
- HumanEval92.0
Codestral 2 fits when…
- Fast inline completion
- FIM support
- Self-hostable for IP-sensitive teams
- Long-context tasks, handles 256K tokens vs 128K for Mistral Small.
Mistral Small fits when…
- Apache-2.0 open-weight
- Fast and cheap
- Cost-sensitive workloads, 1.5× cheaper than Codestral 2 on output tokens.
Consider Mistral Large 2
Mistral's flagship API model, strong on code and reasoning, EU-friendly hosting.
Frequently asked
Is Codestral 2 or Mistral Small cheaper?
Mistral Small is cheaper at $0.60 / 1M tokens per million output tokens, vs $0.90 / 1M tokens for Codestral 2.Which has the larger context window?
Codestral 2 accepts 256K tokens vs 128K for Mistral Small.Is Codestral 2 or Mistral Small better for coding?
Both Codestral 2 and Mistral Small are competitive on coding benchmarks. See each model's individual spec page for HumanEval and SWE-bench scores where published. For an opinionated pick, consult our Best LLM for Coding ranking.Are either of these models open source?
Both ship with open weights. Codestral 2 is licensed under Mistral Non-Production License; Mistral Small under Apache-2.0.When were Codestral 2 and Mistral Small released?
Codestral 2 was released by Mistral on 2025-01-14. Mistral Small was released by Mistral on 2024-09-18.
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