Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite vs Ministral 3 8B
Which is better for the money: Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite by Google or Ministral 3 8B 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
Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite scores 16.7 points higher (22.2 vs 5.5) but costs 13× as much to run the benchmark ($366 vs $27.5; mid-range vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite when you need intelligence above 5.5, and Ministral 3 8B when 5.5 is enough.
| Metric | Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite | Ministral 3 8B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 22.2 | 5.5 | −75.2% Ministral 3 8B is 75.2% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $365.63 | $27.47 | −92.5% Ministral 3 8B is 92.5% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 9.09s | 4.90s | −46.1% Ministral 3 8B is 46.1% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.30 / $2.50 | $0.15 / $0.15 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image |
Ministral 3 8B vs Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite: 75.2% less intelligence, 92.5% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 46.1% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Medium) scores 47.80 for $361.
- Ministral 3 8B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Low) scores 21.50 for $10.6.
Gemini 3.5 Flash-LiteMinistral 3 8BToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
Compare something else
Agents:
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/gemini-3-5-flash-lite/ministral-3-8b · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gemini-3-5-flash-lite/ministral-3-8b?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill