GPT-5.6 Terra (Max) vs Mistral Medium 3.5
Which is better for the money: GPT-5.6 Terra (Max) by OpenAI or Mistral Medium 3.5 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
GPT-5.6 Terra (Max) scores 27.9 points higher (42.1 vs 14.2) but costs 2.0× as much to run the benchmark ($2501 vs $1264; flagship vs premium cost classes). Pick GPT-5.6 Terra (Max) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Mistral Medium 3.5.
| Metric | GPT-5.6 Terra (Max) | Mistral Medium 3.5 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 42.1 | 14.2 | −66.3% Mistral Medium 3.5 is 66.3% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $2,500.72 | $1,263.80 | −49.5% Mistral Medium 3.5 is 49.5% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 107.91s | 17.98s | −83.3% Mistral Medium 3.5 is 83.3% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $2.00 / $12.0 | $1.50 / $7.50 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Mistral Medium 3.5 vs GPT-5.6 Terra (Max): 66.3% less intelligence, 49.5% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 83.3% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- GPT-5.6 Terra (Max) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (High, Default Fallback) scores 53.60 for $2172.
- Mistral Medium 3.5 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
GPT-5.6 Terra (Max)Mistral Medium 3.5Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/gpt-5-6-terra/mistral-medium-3-5 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gpt-5-6-terra/mistral-medium-3-5?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill