Mistral Large 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
Mistral Large 2 specs · Mistral Small specs- PriceMistral Small
Mistral Small is roughly 10.0× cheaper on output tokens ($0.60 vs $6.00 per 1M).
- Context windowTie
Both ship a 128K-token context window.
- 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 Mistral Small edges ahead, winning 1 of 5 categories against Mistral Large 2's 0. Mistral Small is roughly 10.0× cheaper on output tokens ($0.60 vs $6.00 per 1M). Both ship a 128K-token context window.
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.
Mistral Small is the newer of the two, released 2 months after Mistral Large 2, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. Mistral Large 2 is usually picked for coding llm and multilingual 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 | Mistral Large 2 | Mistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral | Mistral |
| Released | Jul 2024 | Sep 2024 |
| Modalities | text | text |
| Context window | 128K tokens | 128K tokens |
| Max output | , | , |
| Input · 1M | $2.00 / 1M tokens | $0.20 / 1M tokens |
| Output · 1M | $6.00 / 1M tokens | $0.60 / 1M tokens |
| Knowledge cutoff | 2024-04 | , |
| Open weights | Yes (Mistral Research 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$15.00 vs $1.50
- Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day$150 vs $15.00
- RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day$336 vs $33.60
Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: $15.00 vs $1.50 per month, model B comes out ahead. Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: $150 vs $15.00 per month, model B comes out ahead. RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: $336 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.
- Mistral Large 2$0.500
- 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.
- MMLU84.0
- HumanEval92.0
Mistral Large 2 fits when…
- Strong code and math
- EU data residency
- Multilingual
Mistral Small fits when…
- Apache-2.0 open-weight
- Fast and cheap
- Cost-sensitive workloads, 10.0× cheaper than Mistral Large 2 on output tokens.
Consider Mistral Medium
Mistral's mid-tier balanced model, production-ready at competitive pricing.
Frequently asked
Is Mistral Large 2 or Mistral Small cheaper?
Mistral Small is cheaper at $0.60 / 1M tokens per million output tokens, vs $6.00 / 1M tokens for Mistral Large 2.Which has the larger context window?
Both Mistral Large 2 and Mistral Small ship a 128K-token context window.Is Mistral Large 2 or Mistral Small better for coding?
Both Mistral Large 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. Mistral Large 2 is licensed under Mistral Research License; Mistral Small under Apache-2.0.When were Mistral Large 2 and Mistral Small released?
Mistral Large 2 was released by Mistral on 2024-07-24. Mistral Small was released by Mistral on 2024-09-18.
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