Model comparison

MiniMax-M2 vs Mistral Small 3

MiniMax-M2 is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.4 to 31.2 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 9.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when MiniMax-M2's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 14 shared benchmarks.

MiniMax-M2

MiniMax

37.4

Rank #204 Confirmed

Mistral Small 3

Mistral AI

31.2

Rank #278 Confirmed

Summary

They share 14 benchmarks with published results for both. MiniMax-M2 scores higher in 8 categories and Mistral Small 3 in 0 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in math, where MiniMax-M2 leads 37.3 to 16.3.
Mistral Small 3 is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.08 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $1.20 for MiniMax-M2.
MiniMax-M2 accepts more context: 205K tokens versus 33K.

Side by side

MiniMax-M2 and Mistral Small 3 specifications
	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
Provider	MiniMax	Mistral AI
Noometry Index	37.4	31.2
Released	2025-10-27	2025-01-30
Weights	Open	Open
Context window	205K	33K
Max output	131K	16K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.30	$0.05
Output $ / M tokens	$1.20	$0.08
Results tracked	21	24

Sponsored placements are available on pages like this one. Advertise on Noometry

Category by category

Coding MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 39.3 (#159), Mistral Small 3: 36.5 (#207)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Coding	1370	1246
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)	61%	—
LMArena WebDev	1297	—
BigCodeBench Instruct	—	45.3%
BigCodeBench Complete	—	50.4%

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

MiniMax-M2: 25.1 (#109), Mistral Small 3: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
Terminal-Bench	30%	—
Vending-Bench 2	160.6	—

Reasoning Too close to call

MiniMax-M2: 19.4 (#258), Mistral Small 3: 18.9 (#273)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Hard Prompts	1357	1233
Kagi LLM Benchmark	57.8%	—
NYT Connections (extended)	14.8%	—
Chess Puzzles	—	0%
Epoch Capabilities Index	—	127.07

Math MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 37.3 (#160), Mistral Small 3: 16.3 (#295)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Math	1352	1240
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025	—	6.7%

Knowledge MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 37.0 (#163), Mistral Small 3: 25.1 (#263)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Expert	1337	1202
GPQA Diamond	—	47.3%
Confabulations	—	25.2%

Multilingual MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 45.3 (#171), Mistral Small 3: 37.3 (#236)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Non-English	1313	1198
LMArena Chinese	1366	1204
LMArena French	1335	1203
LMArena German	1355	1211
LMArena Russian	1331	1216
LMArena Japanese	—	1111
LMArena Korean	—	1188
LMArena Spanish	1326	—

Instruction Following MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 70.2 (#166), Mistral Small 3: 63.7 (#229)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Instruction Following	1328	1214

Long Context MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 40.5 (#153), Mistral Small 3: 37.8 (#211)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Longer Query	1331	1246

Writing & Preference MiniMax-M2 leads

MiniMax-M2: 53.0 (#162), Mistral Small 3: 32.2 (#280)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	MiniMax-M2	Mistral Small 3
LMArena Text	1340	1234
LMArena Creative Writing	1286	1195
LMArena Multi-Turn	1361	1217
EQ-Bench Creative Writing	—	707

Frequently asked questions

Is MiniMax-M2 better than Mistral Small 3?

Which is cheaper, MiniMax-M2 or Mistral Small 3?

Mistral Small 3 is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.08 per million output tokens; MiniMax-M2 lists at $0.30 and $1.20.

Is MiniMax-M2 or Mistral Small 3 better for coding?

MiniMax-M2 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.3 versus 36.5 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

MiniMax-M2 does, with 205K tokens against 33K.

How many benchmarks do MiniMax-M2 and Mistral Small 3 share?

14 benchmarks have published results for both models. MiniMax-M2 has 21 scored results on Noometry and Mistral Small 3 has 24.