Mistral Small vs Pixtral Large
A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.
Updated
Mistral Small specs · Pixtral Large specs- PriceMistral Small
Mistral Small publishes pricing ($0.60 / 1M output tokens) while Pixtral Large does not.
- 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.
- ModalitiesPixtral Large
Pixtral Large supports 2 modalities (text, vision) vs 1 for Mistral Small.
- OpennessTie
Both ship open weights, self-host either one.
It's a genuine coin-flip between Mistral Small and Pixtral Large: 1 category wins each, with the rest tied. Mistral Small publishes pricing ($0.60 / 1M output tokens) while Pixtral Large does not. Both ship a 128K-token context window.
No directly comparable public benchmarks are available for both models, check the spec sheets for individual scores. They differ in modality coverage, Mistral Small handles text while Pixtral Large handles text, vision, which can be the deciding factor before you even look at benchmarks. Both ship open weights, self-host either one.
Pixtral Large is the newer of the two, released 2 months after Mistral Small, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. Mistral Small is usually picked for cheapest llm and fastest llm workloads, while Pixtral Large sees more deployments in vision and ocr. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.
Side-by-side specs
| Spec | Mistral Small | Pixtral Large |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral | Mistral |
| Released | Sep 2024 | Nov 2024 |
| Modalities | text | text, vision |
| Context window | 128K tokens | 128K tokens |
| Max output | , | , |
| Input · 1M | $0.20 / 1M tokens | Pricing not published |
| Output · 1M | $0.60 / 1M tokens | Pricing not published |
| Knowledge cutoff | , | , |
| Open weights | Yes (Apache-2.0) | Yes (Mistral Research License) |
| 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$1.50 vs ,
- Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day$15.00 vs ,
- RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day$33.60 vs ,
Light usage, 100k in / 50k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates). RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day: pricing not directly comparable (one or both models are missing public per-token rates).
Estimated spend for the listed models at your usage. Numbers are derived from each model's published per-million-token rates.
- Mistral Small$0.050
- Pixtral LargePricing unavailable
Benchmarks compared
Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.
Mistral Small fits when…
- Apache-2.0 open-weight
- Fast and cheap
Pixtral Large fits when…
- Strong document AI
- Open weights
- Multimodal needs covering vision.
Consider Mistral Large 2
Mistral's flagship API model, strong on code and reasoning, EU-friendly hosting.
Frequently asked
Is Mistral Small or Pixtral Large cheaper?
Per-token pricing isn't published for at least one of these models, check each model's spec page for current rates.Which has the larger context window?
Both Mistral Small and Pixtral Large ship a 128K-token context window.Is Mistral Small or Pixtral Large better for coding?
Both Mistral Small and Pixtral Large 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 Small is licensed under Apache-2.0; Pixtral Large under Mistral Research License.When were Mistral Small and Pixtral Large released?
Mistral Small was released by Mistral on 2024-09-18. Pixtral Large was released by Mistral on 2024-11-18.
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