Model comparison

Llama 3.2 3B vs Magistral Small

Magistral Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 29.9 to 28.4 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3.2 3B costs 6.2× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Magistral Small's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 0 shared benchmarks.

Llama 3.2 3B

Summary

The widest gap is in reasoning, where Llama 3.2 3B leads 20.1 to 6.9.
Llama 3.2 3B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.33 per million input/output tokens, against $0.50 / $1.50 for Magistral Small.
Llama 3.2 3B accepts more context: 131K tokens versus 128K.

Side by side

Llama 3.2 3B and Magistral Small specifications
	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
Provider	Meta	Mistral AI
Noometry Index	28.4	29.9
Released	2024-09-24	2025-06-10
Weights	Open	Open
Context window	131K	128K
Max output	118K	40K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.05	$0.50
Output $ / M tokens	$0.33	$1.50
Results tracked	18	10

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Category by category

Coding Magistral Small leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 27.1 (#314), Magistral Small: 37.8 (#172)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
SciCode	—	35.2%
BigCodeBench Instruct	23.4%	—
LMArena Coding	1098	—
BigCodeBench Complete	28.3%	—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 19.9 (#135), Magistral Small: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard	21.9%	—
BALROG	10.1%	—

Reasoning Llama 3.2 3B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 20.1 (#225), Magistral Small: 6.9 (#345)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
ARC-AGI-2	—	0%
Kagi LLM Benchmark	—	6.3%
ARC-AGI-1	—	5%
CritPt	—	0.3%
Chess Puzzles	—	3%
LMArena Hard Prompts	1095	—
DTBench	—	61.3%
Epoch Capabilities Index	—	133.19

Math Llama 3.2 3B leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 29.9 (#213), Magistral Small: 24.9 (#253)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	—	30%
LMArena Math	1126	—

Knowledge Magistral Small leads

Llama 3.2 3B: 29.1 (#232), Magistral Small: 30.9 (#215)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
GPQA Diamond	—	56.1%
LMArena Expert	1090	—

Multilingual Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 26.4 (#276), Magistral Small: —

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
LMArena Non-English	1019	—
LMArena Chinese	1017	—
LMArena German	1056	—
LMArena Russian	949	—

Instruction Following Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 56.3 (#270), Magistral Small: —

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
LMArena Instruction Following	1089	—

Long Context Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 33.4 (#256), Magistral Small: —

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
LMArena Longer Query	1101	—

Writing & Preference Not comparable

Llama 3.2 3B: 24.9 (#302), Magistral Small: —

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Llama 3.2 3B	Magistral Small
LMArena Text	1110	—
LMArena Creative Writing	1094	—
EQ-Bench Creative Writing	595	—
LMArena Multi-Turn	1105	—

Frequently asked questions

Is Llama 3.2 3B better than Magistral Small?

Which is cheaper, Llama 3.2 3B or Magistral Small?

Llama 3.2 3B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.33 per million output tokens; Magistral Small lists at $0.50 and $1.50.

Is Llama 3.2 3B or Magistral Small better for coding?

Magistral Small scores higher on coding benchmarks: 37.8 versus 27.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Llama 3.2 3B does, with 131K tokens against 128K.

How many benchmarks do Llama 3.2 3B and Magistral Small share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Llama 3.2 3B has 18 scored results on Noometry and Magistral Small has 10.