Model comparison

Granite 4.2 30b vs Mistral Small 3.1

Granite 4.2 30b is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.8 to 31.7 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 11 shared benchmarks.

Granite 4.2 30b IBM

41.8

Rank #130 Confirmed

Mistral Small 3.1 Mistral AI

31.7

Rank #269 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 30b scores higher in 7 categories and Mistral Small 3.1 in 0 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Granite 4.2 30b leads 53.8 to 37.0.

Side by side

Granite 4.2 30b and Mistral Small 3.1 specifications
Granite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
ProviderIBMMistral AI
Noometry Index41.831.7
Released—2025-03-17
WeightsOpenOpen
Context window—128K
Max output—102K
Input $ / M tokens—$0.35
Output $ / M tokens—$0.56
Results tracked1128

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Category by category

Coding Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 41.0 (#126), Mistral Small 3.1: 38.3 (#179)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Coding13961309

Reasoning Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 27.8 (#112), Mistral Small 3.1: 19.7 (#254)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Hard Prompts13741278
Chess Puzzles—1%
Epoch Capabilities Index—127.48

Math Not comparable

Granite 4.2 30b: —, Mistral Small 3.1: 14.7 (#301)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025—3.9%
Omni-MATH—24.8%
LMArena Math—1262

Knowledge Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 39.1 (#138), Mistral Small 3.1: 22.6 (#271)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Expert14061257
GPQA Diamond—41.9%
MMLU-Pro—61%
GPQA (HELM)—39.2%

Multimodal Not comparable

Granite 4.2 30b: —, Mistral Small 3.1: 33.2 (#99)

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Vision—1136

Multilingual Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 47.3 (#151), Mistral Small 3.1: 41.2 (#209)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Non-English13401255
LMArena Chinese14141253
LMArena Russian13431263
LMArena French—1273
LMArena German—1266
LMArena Japanese—1208
LMArena Korean—1206
LMArena Spanish—1283

Instruction Following Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 71.2 (#155), Mistral Small 3.1: 63.6 (#230)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Instruction Following13471264
IFEval—75%

Long Context Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 41.4 (#140), Mistral Small 3.1: 39.5 (#178)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Longer Query13591299

Writing & Preference Granite 4.2 30b leads

Granite 4.2 30b: 53.8 (#156), Mistral Small 3.1: 37.0 (#259)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGranite 4.2 30bMistral Small 3.1
LMArena Text13611277
LMArena Creative Writing12881253
LMArena Multi-Turn13391270
EQ-Bench Creative Writing—761
WildBench—78.8%

Frequently asked questions

Is Granite 4.2 30b better than Mistral Small 3.1?

Granite 4.2 30b is the stronger model overall, scoring 41.8 to 31.7 on the Noometry Index.

Is Granite 4.2 30b or Mistral Small 3.1 better for coding?

Granite 4.2 30b scores higher on coding benchmarks: 41.0 versus 38.3 in the Noometry coding category.

How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 30b and Mistral Small 3.1 share?

11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 30b has 11 scored results on Noometry and Mistral Small 3.1 has 28.

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