Granite 4.2 30B vs Mistral Large 3
Which is better for the money: Granite 4.2 30B by IBM or Mistral Large 3 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
Granite 4.2 30B scores 3.4 points higher (12.7 vs 9.3) but costs 2.4× as much to run the benchmark ($111 vs $46.4; mid-range vs budget cost classes). Pick Granite 4.2 30B when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Mistral Large 3.
| Metric | Granite 4.2 30B | Mistral Large 3 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 12.7 | 9.3 | −26.8% Mistral Large 3 is 26.8% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $110.83 | $46.41 | −58.1% Mistral Large 3 is 58.1% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 51.51s | 7.23s | −86.0% Mistral Large 3 is 86.0% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.16 / $0.65 | $0.50 / $1.50 | |
| Input modalities | Text | Text, Image |
Mistral Large 3 vs Granite 4.2 30B: 26.8% less intelligence, 58.1% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 86.0% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Granite 4.2 30B is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Flash scores 37.90 for $110.
- Mistral Large 3 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Medium) scores 29.90 for $31.2.
Granite 4.2 30BMistral Large 3Today'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/granite-4-2-30b/mistral-large-3 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/granite-4-2-30b/mistral-large-3?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill