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Jamba 1.5 Mini 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

Jamba 1.5 Mini specs · Mistral Small specs
Verdict by category
  • PriceJamba 1.5 Mini

    Jamba 1.5 Mini is roughly 1.5× cheaper on output tokens ($0.40 vs $0.60 per 1M).

  • Context windowJamba 1.5 Mini

    Jamba 1.5 Mini 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.

On balance Jamba 1.5 Mini edges ahead, winning 2 of 5 categories against Mistral Small's 0. Jamba 1.5 Mini is roughly 1.5× cheaper on output tokens ($0.40 vs $0.60 per 1M). Jamba 1.5 Mini 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.

Both shipped within roughly a month of each other in 2024, so they share the same generation of training data and tooling. Jamba 1.5 Mini is usually picked for long context and summarization 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

SpecJamba 1.5 MiniMistral Small
ProviderAI21Mistral
ReleasedAug 2024Sep 2024
Modalitiestexttext
Context window256K tokens128K tokens
Max output,,
Input · 1M$0.20 / 1M tokens$0.20 / 1M tokens
Output · 1M$0.40 / 1M tokens$0.60 / 1M tokens
Knowledge cutoff,,
Open weightsYes (Jamba Open Model License)Yes (Apache-2.0)
API availableYesYes

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$1.20 vs $1.50
  • Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day$12.00 vs $15.00
  • RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day$32.40 vs $33.60

Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: $1.20 vs $1.50 per month, model A comes out ahead. Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: $12.00 vs $15.00 per month, model A comes out ahead. RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: $32.40 vs $33.60 per month, model A comes out ahead.

Price calculator

Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.

  • Jamba 1.5 Mini$0.040
  • 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.

Benchmark scores not yet available. We only publish numbers we can source from official model cards or independent leaderboards, see methodology.
Pick Jamba 1.5 Mini if

Jamba 1.5 Mini fits when…

  • 256k context at small-model price
  • Hybrid SSM-Transformer is efficient on long inputs
  • Open weights for self-hosting
  • Cost-sensitive workloads, 1.5× cheaper than Mistral Small on output tokens.
  • Long-context tasks, handles 256K tokens vs 128K for Mistral Small.
Pick Mistral Small if

Mistral Small fits when…

  • Apache-2.0 open-weight
  • Fast and cheap
Don't want either?

Consider Jamba 1.5 Large

AI21's hybrid SSM-Transformer with a 256k context window, strong on long-doc tasks.

See Jamba 1.5 Large specsJamba 1.5 Mini vs Jamba 1.5 LargeMistral Small vs Jamba 1.5 Large

Frequently asked

  • Is Jamba 1.5 Mini or Mistral Small cheaper?
    Jamba 1.5 Mini is cheaper at $0.40 / 1M tokens per million output tokens, vs $0.60 / 1M tokens for Mistral Small.
  • Which has the larger context window?
    Jamba 1.5 Mini accepts 256K tokens vs 128K for Mistral Small.
  • Is Jamba 1.5 Mini or Mistral Small better for coding?
    Both Jamba 1.5 Mini 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. Jamba 1.5 Mini is licensed under Jamba Open Model License; Mistral Small under Apache-2.0.
  • When were Jamba 1.5 Mini and Mistral Small released?
    Jamba 1.5 Mini was released by AI21 on 2024-08-22. Mistral Small was released by Mistral on 2024-09-18.
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