Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) vs Ministral 3 3B
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) by Anthropic or Ministral 3 3B by Mistral? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-26.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) scores 48.8 points higher (53.6 vs 4.8) but costs 178× as much to run the benchmark ($2172 vs $12.2; flagship vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) when you need intelligence above 4.8, and Ministral 3 3B when 4.8 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) | Ministral 3 3B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 53.6 | 4.8 | −91.0% Ministral 3 3B is 91.0% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $2,172.43 | $12.23 | −99.4% Ministral 3 3B is 99.4% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 41.01s | 3.13s | −92.4% Ministral 3 3B is 92.4% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $4.00 / $20.0 | $0.10 / $0.10 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Ministral 3 3B vs Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback): 91.0% less intelligence, 99.4% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 92.4% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) is on today's frontier: nothing is both smarter and cheaper.
- Ministral 3 3B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Low) scores 21.50 for $10.6.
Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback)Ministral 3 3BToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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