Mistral Small 3.1 vs Solar Mini 4
Which is better for the money: Mistral Small 3.1 by Mistral or Solar Mini 4 by Upstage? 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
Solar Mini 4 scores 17.0 points higher (24.1 vs 7.1) but costs 18× as much to run the benchmark ($502 vs $27.8; premium vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Solar Mini 4 when you need intelligence above 7.1, and Mistral Small 3.1 when 7.1 is enough.
| Metric | Mistral Small 3.1 | Solar Mini 4 | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 7.1 | 24.1 | +239.4% Solar Mini 4 is 3.4× more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $27.82 | $502.02 | +1704.5% Solar Mini 4 is 18× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 11.78s | 27.46s | +133.1% Solar Mini 4 is 133.1% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.08 / $0.14 | $0.10 / $0.40 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text |
Solar Mini 4 vs Mistral Small 3.1: 239.4% more intelligence, 1704.5% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 133.1% 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.
- Solar Mini 4 is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Medium) scores 47.80 for $361.
Mistral Small 3.1Solar Mini 4Today'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/solar-mini4 · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/mistral-small-3-1/solar-mini4?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill