GPT-5 mini (High) vs Mistral Small 3.2
Which is better for the money: GPT-5 mini (High) by OpenAI or Mistral Small 3.2 by Mistral? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
GPT-5 mini (High) scores 9.8 points higher (16.8 vs 7.0) but costs 1.5× as much to run the benchmark ($189 vs $122; both mid-range class). Pick GPT-5 mini (High) when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Mistral Small 3.2.
| Metric | GPT-5 mini (High) | Mistral Small 3.2 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 16.8 | 7.0 | −58.3% Mistral Small 3.2 is 58.3% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $188.66 | $121.78 | −35.5% Mistral Small 3.2 is 35.5% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 58.72s | 12.54s | −78.6% Mistral Small 3.2 is 78.6% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.25 / $2.00 | $0.07 / $0.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Mistral Small 3.2 vs GPT-5 mini (High): 58.3% less intelligence, 35.5% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 78.6% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- GPT-5 mini (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Haiku 5.5 (Xhigh) scores 41.20 for $158.
- Mistral Small 3.2 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Flash scores 37.90 for $110.
GPT-5 mini (High)Mistral Small 3.2Today'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-mini/mistral-small-3-2 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gpt-5-mini/mistral-small-3-2?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill