Model comparison
Mistral Small 3 vs Qwen3.6 35B-A3B
Qwen3.6 35B-A3B is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.6 to 31.2 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 9.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.6 35B-A3B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 4 shared benchmarks.
Mistral AI
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 4 benchmarks with published results for both. Mistral Small 3 scores higher in 0 categories and Qwen3.6 35B-A3B in 4 categories; 3 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Qwen3.6 35B-A3B leads 51.3 to 25.1.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 6.7% for Mistral Small 3 and 86.7% for Qwen3.6 35B-A3B.
- Mistral Small 3 is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.08 per million input/output tokens, against $0.25 / $1.49 for Qwen3.6 35B-A3B.
- Qwen3.6 35B-A3B accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 33K.
Side by side
| Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 31.2 | 37.6 |
| Released | 2025-01-30 | 2026-04-01 |
| Weights | Open | Open |
| Context window | 33K | 262K |
| Max output | 16K | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $0.05 | $0.25 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $0.08 | $1.49 |
| Results tracked | 24 | 14 |
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Category by category
Coding Too close to call
Mistral Small 3: 36.5 (#207), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: 37.2 (#196)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | — | 35.8% |
| WeirdML | — | 34.5% |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 45.3% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1246 | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 50.4% | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Mistral Small 3: —, Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: 22.1 (#134)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | — | 23% |
Reasoning Qwen3.6 35B-A3B leads
Mistral Small 3: 18.9 (#273), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: 28.0 (#109)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | 26% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 127.07 | 143.93 |
| NYT Connections (extended) | — | 41.6% |
| CritPt | — | 0.3% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1233 | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 22% |
| DTBench | — | 73.9% |
| LMCA | — | 29.7% |
| Surface Evolver Bench | — | 44.4% |
Math Qwen3.6 35B-A3B leads
Mistral Small 3: 16.3 (#295), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: 38.9 (#121)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 6.7% | 86.7% |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | — | 20.4% |
| LMArena Math | 1240 | — |
Knowledge Qwen3.6 35B-A3B leads
Mistral Small 3: 25.1 (#263), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: 51.3 (#68)
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 47.3% | 84.8% |
| Confabulations | 25.2% | — |
| LMArena Expert | 1202 | — |
Multilingual Not comparable
Mistral Small 3: 37.3 (#236), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: —
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1198 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1204 | — |
| LMArena French | 1203 | — |
| LMArena German | 1211 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1111 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1188 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1216 | — |
Instruction Following Not comparable
Mistral Small 3: 63.7 (#229), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: —
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1214 | — |
Long Context Not comparable
Mistral Small 3: 37.8 (#211), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: —
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1246 | — |
Writing & Preference Not comparable
Mistral Small 3: 32.2 (#280), Qwen3.6 35B-A3B: —
| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Qwen3.6 35B-A3B |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1234 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1195 | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 707 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1217 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Mistral Small 3 better than Qwen3.6 35B-A3B?
Qwen3.6 35B-A3B is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.6 to 31.2 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 9.7× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Qwen3.6 35B-A3B's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Mistral Small 3 or Qwen3.6 35B-A3B?
Mistral Small 3 is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.08 per million output tokens; Qwen3.6 35B-A3B lists at $0.25 and $1.49.
Is Mistral Small 3 or Qwen3.6 35B-A3B better for coding?
They score almost the same on coding (36.5 vs 37.2); test both on your own repository before choosing.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3.6 35B-A3B does, with 262K tokens against 33K.
How many benchmarks do Mistral Small 3 and Qwen3.6 35B-A3B share?
4 benchmarks have published results for both models. Mistral Small 3 has 24 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.6 35B-A3B has 14.