# Llama 3.2 3B vs Magistral Small

> Magistral Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 29.9 to 28.4 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3.2 3B costs 6.2× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Magistral Small's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/llama-3-2-3b-vs-magistral-small
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 0

## Summary

- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Llama 3.2 3B leads 20.1 to 6.9.
- Llama 3.2 3B is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.33 per million input/output tokens, against $0.50 / $1.50 for Magistral Small.
- Llama 3.2 3B accepts more context: 131K tokens versus 128K.

## Snapshot

| | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Meta | Mistral AI |
| Noometry Index | 28.4 | 29.9 |
| Rank | 318 | 289 |
| Context | 131K | 128K |
| Input $/M | $0.05 | $0.50 |
| Output $/M | $0.33 | $1.50 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Llama 3.2 3B: 27.1 (#314)
- Magistral Small: 37.8 (#172)

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | — | 35.2% |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 23.4% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1098 | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 28.3% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Llama 3.2 3B: 19.9 (#135)
- Magistral Small: —

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 21.9% | — |
| BALROG | 10.1% | — |

## Reasoning

- Llama 3.2 3B: 20.1 (#225)
- Magistral Small: 6.9 (#345)

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| ARC-AGI-2 | — | 0% |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | — | 6.3% |
| ARC-AGI-1 | — | 5% |
| CritPt | — | 0.3% |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 3% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1095 | — |
| DTBench | — | 61.3% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 133.19 |

## Math

- Llama 3.2 3B: 29.9 (#213)
- Magistral Small: 24.9 (#253)

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 30% |
| LMArena Math | 1126 | — |

## Knowledge

- Llama 3.2 3B: 29.1 (#232)
- Magistral Small: 30.9 (#215)

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | — | 56.1% |
| LMArena Expert | 1090 | — |

## Multilingual

- Llama 3.2 3B: 26.4 (#276)
- Magistral Small: —

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1019 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1017 | — |
| LMArena German | 1056 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 949 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Llama 3.2 3B: 56.3 (#270)
- Magistral Small: —

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1089 | — |

## Long Context

- Llama 3.2 3B: 33.4 (#256)
- Magistral Small: —

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1101 | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Llama 3.2 3B: 24.9 (#302)
- Magistral Small: —

| Benchmark | Llama 3.2 3B | Magistral Small |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1110 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1094 | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 595 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1105 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Llama 3.2 3B better than Magistral Small?

Magistral Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 29.9 to 28.4 on the Noometry Index. Llama 3.2 3B costs 6.2× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Magistral Small's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Llama 3.2 3B or Magistral Small?

Llama 3.2 3B is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.33 per million output tokens; Magistral Small lists at $0.50 and $1.50.

### Is Llama 3.2 3B or Magistral Small better for coding?

Magistral Small scores higher on coding benchmarks: 37.8 versus 27.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Llama 3.2 3B does, with 131K tokens against 128K.

### How many benchmarks do Llama 3.2 3B and Magistral Small share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Llama 3.2 3B has 18 scored results on Noometry and Magistral Small has 10.