Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium) vs Ministral 3 14B
Which is better for the money: Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium) by Anthropic or Ministral 3 14B 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 Sonnet 5 (Medium) scores 22.1 points higher (28.1 vs 6.0) but costs 32× as much to run the benchmark ($1218 vs $37.6; premium vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium) when you need intelligence above 6.0, and Ministral 3 14B when 6.0 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium) | Ministral 3 14B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 28.1 | 6.0 | −78.6% Ministral 3 14B is 78.6% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,218.17 | $37.56 | −96.9% Ministral 3 14B is 96.9% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 9.17s | 7.71s | −15.9% Ministral 3 14B is 15.9% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $10.0 | $0.20 / $0.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Ministral 3 14B vs Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium): 78.6% less intelligence, 96.9% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 15.9% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
- Ministral 3 14B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Medium) scores 29.90 for $31.2.
Claude Sonnet 5 (Medium)Ministral 3 14BToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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