Noometry

Model comparison

Mistral Small 3.1 vs Nova 2 Lite

Nova 2 Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 31.4 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3.1 costs 2.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Nova 2 Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 17 shared benchmarks.

Mistral Small 3.1 Mistral AI

31.4

Rank #263 Confirmed

Nova 2 Lite Amazon

39.0

Rank #161 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Mistral Small 3.1 scores higher in 0 categories and Nova 2 Lite in 8 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where Nova 2 Lite leads 34.8 to 13.7.
  • Mistral Small 3.1 is cheaper at $0.35 / $0.56 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $2.50 for Nova 2 Lite.
  • Nova 2 Lite accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 128K.
  • Mistral Small 3.1 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Mistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
ProviderMistral AIAmazon
Noometry Index31.439.0
Released2025-03-172025-12-01
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window128K1M
Max output102K64K
Input $ / M tokens$0.35$0.30
Output $ / M tokens$0.56$2.50
Results tracked2819

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Category by category

Coding Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 37.7 (#175), Nova 2 Lite: 40.1 (#131)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Coding13091386

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Mistral Small 3.1: —, Nova 2 Lite: 23.9 (#114)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard—27.1%

Reasoning Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 18.9 (#249), Nova 2 Lite: 26.4 (#120)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Hard Prompts12781364
Chess Puzzles1%—
Epoch Capabilities Index127.48—

Math Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 13.7 (#295), Nova 2 Lite: 34.8 (#154)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Math12611359
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-20253.9%—
Omni-MATH24.8%—

Knowledge Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 22.6 (#266), Nova 2 Lite: 42.5 (#88)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Expert12581360
GPQA Diamond41.9%—
MMLU-Pro61%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate—5.1%
GPQA (HELM)39.2%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Mistral Small 3.1: 32.6 (#93), Nova 2 Lite: —

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Vision1136—

Multilingual Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 41.4 (#204), Nova 2 Lite: 47.3 (#148)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Non-English12551337
LMArena Chinese12541364
LMArena French12701381
LMArena German12661343
LMArena Japanese12101273
LMArena Korean12061284
LMArena Russian12631343
LMArena Spanish12831372

Instruction Following Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 63.8 (#225), Nova 2 Lite: 70.7 (#156)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Instruction Following12641335
IFEval75%—

Long Context Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 39.5 (#172), Nova 2 Lite: 40.6 (#145)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Longer Query13001335

Writing & Preference Nova 2 Lite leads

Mistral Small 3.1: 37.2 (#254), Nova 2 Lite: 54.1 (#150)

BenchmarkMistral Small 3.1Nova 2 Lite
LMArena Text12781362
LMArena Creative Writing12531291
LMArena Multi-Turn12701338
EQ-Bench Creative Writing761—
WildBench78.8%—

Frequently asked questions

Is Mistral Small 3.1 better than Nova 2 Lite?

Nova 2 Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 31.4 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3.1 costs 2.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Nova 2 Lite's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Mistral Small 3.1 or Nova 2 Lite?

Mistral Small 3.1 is cheaper. It lists at $0.35 per million input tokens and $0.56 per million output tokens; Nova 2 Lite lists at $0.30 and $2.50.

Is Mistral Small 3.1 or Nova 2 Lite better for coding?

Nova 2 Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 37.7 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Nova 2 Lite does, with 1M tokens against 128K.

How many benchmarks do Mistral Small 3.1 and Nova 2 Lite share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Mistral Small 3.1 has 28 scored results on Noometry and Nova 2 Lite has 19.

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