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Mixtral 8×22B vs Qwen3-72B

A complete head-to-head: pricing, context window, benchmarks, modality coverage, and openness, with a programmatic verdict synthesized from the underlying data.

Updated

Mixtral 8×22B specs · Qwen3-72B specs
Verdict by category
  • PriceTie

    Neither model publishes per-token API pricing.

  • Context windowQwen3-72B

    Qwen3-72B accepts 128K tokens vs 64K, 2.0× the room for long documents and codebases.

  • BenchmarksQwen3-72B

    Qwen3-72B leads in 1 of 1 shared benchmarks; the biggest gap is on MMLU (broad academic knowledge), where it scores 84.0 vs 77.8.

  • ModalitiesTie

    Both handle text.

  • OpennessTie

    Both ship open weights, self-host either one.

On balance Qwen3-72B edges ahead, winning 2 of 5 categories against Mixtral 8×22B's 0. Neither model publishes per-token API pricing. Qwen3-72B accepts 128K tokens vs 64K, 2.0× the room for long documents and codebases.

Qwen3-72B leads in 1 of 1 shared benchmarks; the biggest gap is on MMLU (broad academic knowledge), where it scores 84.0 vs 77.8. 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.

Qwen3-72B is the newer of the two, released 13 months after Mixtral 8×22B, which usually means a more recent knowledge cutoff and updated safety post-training. Mixtral 8×22B is usually picked for open source llm and commercial use llm workloads, while Qwen3-72B sees more deployments in open source llm and commercial use llm. If pricing matters more than every last benchmark point, run the numbers in the calculator below before committing.

Side-by-side specs

SpecMixtral 8×22BQwen3-72B
ProviderMistralAlibaba
ReleasedApr 2024Apr 2025
Modalitiestexttext
Context window64K tokens128K tokens
Max output,,
Input · 1MPricing not publishedPricing not published
Output · 1MPricing not publishedPricing not published
Knowledge cutoff,,
Open weightsYes (Apache-2.0)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, vs ,
  • Heavy usage, 1M in / 500k out per day, vs ,
  • RAG workload, 5M in / 200k out per day, 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).

Price calculator

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

  • Mixtral 8×22BPricing unavailable
  • Qwen3-72BPricing unavailable

Benchmarks compared

Only sourced numbers. Where a benchmark is missing for one model we show the available value rather than fabricating the other.

Mixtral 8×22BQwen3-72B
  • MMLU77.884.0
Pick Mixtral 8×22B if

Mixtral 8×22B fits when…

  • Apache-2.0
  • MoE economics
  • Mature
Pick Qwen3-72B if

Qwen3-72B fits when…

  • Apache-2.0 license
  • Strongest open-weight on Chinese
  • Strong multilingual coverage
  • Long-context tasks, handles 128K tokens vs 64K for Mixtral 8×22B.
Don't want either?

Consider Mistral Large 2

Mistral's flagship API model, strong on code and reasoning, EU-friendly hosting.

See Mistral Large 2 specsMixtral 8×22B vs Mistral Large 2Qwen3-72B vs Mistral Large 2

Frequently asked

  • Is Mixtral 8×22B or Qwen3-72B 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?
    Qwen3-72B accepts 128K tokens vs 64K for Mixtral 8×22B.
  • Is Mixtral 8×22B or Qwen3-72B better for coding?
    Both Mixtral 8×22B and Qwen3-72B 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. Mixtral 8×22B is licensed under Apache-2.0; Qwen3-72B under Apache-2.0.
  • When were Mixtral 8×22B and Qwen3-72B released?
    Mixtral 8×22B was released by Mistral on 2024-04-10. Qwen3-72B was released by Alibaba on 2025-04-29.
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