Mistral Small 3.1 vs Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning)
Which is better for the money: Mistral Small 3.1 by Mistral or Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) by Alibaba? 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
Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) scores 5.6 points higher (12.7 vs 7.1) but costs 8.4× as much to run the benchmark ($234 vs $27.8; mid-range vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) when you need intelligence above 7.1, and Mistral Small 3.1 when 7.1 is enough.
| Metric | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 7.1 | 12.7 | +78.9% Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 … is 78.9% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $27.82 | $233.56 | +739.5% Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 … is 8.4× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 10.82s | 22.73s | +110.1% Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 … is 110.1% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.08 / $0.14 | $0.23 / $2.30 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) vs Mistral Small 3.1: 78.9% more intelligence, 739.5% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 110.1% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Mistral Small 3.1 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Low) scores 21.50 for $10.6.
- Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
Mistral Small 3.1Qwen3 235B A22B 2507 (Reasoning)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-small-3-1/qwen3-235b-a22b-instruct-2507-reasoning · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/mistral-small-3-1/qwen3-235b-a22b-instruct-2507-reasoning?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill