Model comparison
Granite 4.2 3b vs Mistral Small 3.1
Granite 4.2 3b is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.4 to 31.7 on the Noometry Index.
Last verified . 11 shared benchmarks.
Mistral AISummary
- They share 11 benchmarks with published results for both. Granite 4.2 3b scores higher in 6 categories and Mistral Small 3.1 in 1 category; 5 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Granite 4.2 3b leads 36.3 to 22.6.
Side by side
| Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | IBM | Mistral AI |
| Noometry Index | 39.4 | 31.7 |
| Released | — | 2025-03-17 |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | — | 128K |
| Max output | — | 102K |
| Input $ / M tokens | — | $0.35 |
| Output $ / M tokens | — | $0.56 |
| Results tracked | 11 | 28 |
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Category by category
Coding Granite 4.2 3b leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 40.0 (#151), Mistral Small 3.1: 38.3 (#179)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1361 | 1309 |
Reasoning Granite 4.2 3b leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 26.0 (#138), Mistral Small 3.1: 19.7 (#254)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1306 | 1278 |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 1% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 127.48 |
Math Not comparable
Granite 4.2 3b: —, Mistral Small 3.1: 14.7 (#301)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 3.9% |
| Omni-MATH | — | 24.8% |
| LMArena Math | — | 1262 |
Knowledge Granite 4.2 3b leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 36.3 (#171), Mistral Small 3.1: 22.6 (#271)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1315 | 1257 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 41.9% |
| MMLU-Pro | — | 61% |
| GPQA (HELM) | — | 39.2% |
Multimodal Not comparable
Granite 4.2 3b: —, Mistral Small 3.1: 33.2 (#99)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | — | 1136 |
Multilingual Too close to call
Granite 4.2 3b: 42.1 (#198), Mistral Small 3.1: 41.2 (#209)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1268 | 1255 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1269 | 1253 |
| LMArena Russian | 1249 | 1263 |
| LMArena French | — | 1273 |
| LMArena German | — | 1266 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1208 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1206 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1283 |
Instruction Following Granite 4.2 3b leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 67.1 (#200), Mistral Small 3.1: 63.6 (#230)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1273 | 1264 |
| IFEval | — | 75% |
Long Context Too close to call
Granite 4.2 3b: 39.2 (#185), Mistral Small 3.1: 39.5 (#178)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1291 | 1299 |
Writing & Preference Granite 4.2 3b leads
Granite 4.2 3b: 47.2 (#212), Mistral Small 3.1: 37.0 (#259)
| Benchmark | Granite 4.2 3b | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1293 | 1277 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1205 | 1253 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1290 | 1270 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | — | 761 |
| WildBench | — | 78.8% |
Frequently asked questions
Is Granite 4.2 3b better than Mistral Small 3.1?
Granite 4.2 3b is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.4 to 31.7 on the Noometry Index.
Is Granite 4.2 3b or Mistral Small 3.1 better for coding?
Granite 4.2 3b scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.0 versus 38.3 in the Noometry coding category.
How many benchmarks do Granite 4.2 3b and Mistral Small 3.1 share?
11 benchmarks have published results for both models. Granite 4.2 3b has 11 scored results on Noometry and Mistral Small 3.1 has 28.