Model comparison
Ministral 3B vs Qwen3 8B
Qwen3 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.7 to 26.2 on the Noometry Index. Ministral 3B costs 3.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3 8B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 5 shared benchmarks.
Mistral AI
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 5 benchmarks with published results for both. Ministral 3B scores higher in 1 category and Qwen3 8B in 2 categories; 3 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3 8B leads 36.1 to 10.4.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is GPQA Diamond: 25.3% for Ministral 3B and 56.8% for Qwen3 8B.
- Ministral 3B is cheaper at $0.10 / $0.10 per million input/output tokens, against $0.18 / $0.70 for Qwen3 8B.
Side by side
| Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 26.2 | 33.7 |
| Released | 2024-10-01 | 2025-04 |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | 131K | 131K |
| Max output | 262K | 8K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.10 | $0.18 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.10 | $0.70 |
| Results tracked | 6 | 11 |
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Category by category
Coding Not comparable
Ministral 3B: —, Qwen3 8B: 34.0 (#248)
| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | — | 22.6% |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Ministral 3B: —, Qwen3 8B: 30.2 (#78)
| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 42.6% |
Reasoning Ministral 3B leads
Ministral 3B: 18.4 (#282), Qwen3 8B: 16.6 (#303)
| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B |
|---|---|---|
| DTBench | 51.7% | 59.7% |
| LMCA | 5.5% | 8.8% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 118.1 | 136.17 |
| CritPt | — | 0% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 5% |
Math Qwen3 8B leads
Ministral 3B: 26.6 (#258), Qwen3 8B: 34.9 (#191)
| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 56.1% |
| MATH Level 5 | 14.4% | — |
Knowledge Qwen3 8B leads
Ministral 3B: 10.4 (#302), Qwen3 8B: 36.1 (#173)
| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 25.3% | 56.8% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 7.3% | 4.8% |
Long Context Not comparable
Ministral 3B: —, Qwen3 8B: 37.9 (#210)
| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Qwen3 8B |
|---|---|---|
| Fiction.LiveBench | — | 62.1% |
Frequently asked questions
Is Ministral 3B better than Qwen3 8B?
Qwen3 8B is the stronger model overall, scoring 33.7 to 26.2 on the Noometry Index. Ministral 3B costs 3.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3 8B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Ministral 3B or Qwen3 8B?
Ministral 3B is cheaper. It lists at $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.10 per million output tokens; Qwen3 8B lists at $0.18 and $0.70.
Which has the bigger context window?
Both accept 131K tokens.
How many benchmarks do Ministral 3B and Qwen3 8B share?
5 benchmarks have published results for both models. Ministral 3B has 6 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3 8B has 11.