Model comparison
Mistral Small 3.1 vs Qwen Max
Qwen Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 34.7 to 31.7 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3.1 costs 7.0× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 19 shared benchmarks.
Mistral AI
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 19 benchmarks with published results for both. Mistral Small 3.1 scores higher in 2 categories and Qwen Max in 6 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in writing & preference, where Qwen Max leads 47.8 to 37.0.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is GPQA Diamond: 41.9% for Mistral Small 3.1 and 56.1% for Qwen Max.
- Mistral Small 3.1 is cheaper at $0.35 / $0.56 per million input/output tokens, against $1.60 / $6.40 for Qwen Max.
- Mistral Small 3.1 accepts more context: 128K tokens versus 33K.
- Mistral Small 3.1 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 31.7 | 34.7 |
| Released | 2025-03-17 | 2024-04-03 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | 128K | 33K |
| Max output | 102K | 8K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.35 | $1.60 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.56 | $6.40 |
| Results tracked | 28 | 23 |
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Category by category
Coding Mistral Small 3.1 leads
Mistral Small 3.1: 38.3 (#179), Qwen Max: 30.7 (#292)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1309 | 1288 |
| Aider Polyglot | — | 21.8% |
Reasoning Qwen Max leads
Mistral Small 3.1: 19.7 (#254), Qwen Max: 25.1 (#151)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1278 | 1269 |
| Chess Puzzles | 1% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 127.48 | — |
Math Qwen Max leads
Mistral Small 3.1: 14.7 (#301), Qwen Max: 22.3 (#276)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 3.9% | 16.1% |
| LMArena Math | 1262 | 1275 |
| Omni-MATH | 24.8% | — |
| MATH Level 5 | — | 67.2% |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 1% |
Knowledge Qwen Max leads
Mistral Small 3.1: 22.6 (#271), Qwen Max: 30.3 (#228)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 41.9% | 56.1% |
| LMArena Expert | 1257 | 1248 |
| MMLU-Pro | 61% | — |
| GPQA (HELM) | 39.2% | — |
Multimodal Not comparable
Mistral Small 3.1: 33.2 (#99), Qwen Max: —
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1136 | — |
Multilingual Too close to call
Mistral Small 3.1: 41.2 (#209), Qwen Max: 41.8 (#202)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1255 | 1263 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1253 | 1254 |
| LMArena French | 1273 | 1330 |
| LMArena German | 1266 | 1254 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1208 | 1205 |
| LMArena Korean | 1206 | 1142 |
| LMArena Russian | 1263 | 1274 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1283 | 1290 |
Instruction Following Qwen Max leads
Mistral Small 3.1: 63.6 (#230), Qwen Max: 66.5 (#208)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1264 | 1262 |
| IFEval | 75% | — |
Long Context Too close to call
Mistral Small 3.1: 39.5 (#178), Qwen Max: 39.4 (#180)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1299 | 1288 |
| Fiction.LiveBench | — | 66.7% |
Writing & Preference Qwen Max leads
Mistral Small 3.1: 37.0 (#259), Qwen Max: 47.8 (#205)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3.1 | Qwen Max |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1277 | 1282 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1253 | 1248 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1270 | 1277 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 761 | — |
| WildBench | 78.8% | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Mistral Small 3.1 better than Qwen Max?
Qwen Max is the stronger model overall, scoring 34.7 to 31.7 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3.1 costs 7.0× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen Max's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Mistral Small 3.1 or Qwen Max?
Mistral Small 3.1 is cheaper. It lists at $0.35 per million input tokens and $0.56 per million output tokens; Qwen Max lists at $1.60 and $6.40.
Is Mistral Small 3.1 or Qwen Max better for coding?
Mistral Small 3.1 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 38.3 versus 30.7 in the Noometry coding category.
Which has the bigger context window?
Mistral Small 3.1 does, with 128K tokens against 33K.
How many benchmarks do Mistral Small 3.1 and Qwen Max share?
19 benchmarks have published results for both models. Mistral Small 3.1 has 28 scored results on Noometry and Qwen Max has 23.