Mistral Large 4 Preview vs Qwen3.8 27B (Medium)
Which is better for the money: Mistral Large 4 Preview by Mistral or Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-24.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Mistral Large 4 Preview scores 10.8 points higher (38.4 vs 27.6) but costs 1.4× as much to run the benchmark ($1608 vs $1165; both premium class). Pick Mistral Large 4 Preview when the extra intelligence is worth the premium, otherwise Qwen3.8 27B (Medium).
| Metric | Mistral Large 4 Preview | Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 38.4 | 27.6 | −28.1% Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) is 28.1% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $1,607.86 | $1,165.00 | −27.5% Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) is 27.5% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 27.12s | 55.12s | +103.2% Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) is 103.2% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $1.36 / $4.18 | $0.50 / $3.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image, Video |
Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) vs Mistral Large 4 Preview: 28.1% less intelligence, 27.5% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 103.2% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Mistral Large 4 Preview is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
- Qwen3.8 27B (Medium) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Max) scores 51.80 for $1082.
Mistral Large 4 PreviewQwen3.8 27B (Medium)Today'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/mistral-large-4/qwen3-8-27b-medium · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/mistral-large-4/qwen3-8-27b-medium?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill