# Magistral Small vs Nova 2 Lite

> Nova 2 Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 29.9 on the Noometry Index.

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

## Summary

- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Nova 2 Lite leads 26.4 to 6.9.
- Magistral Small is cheaper at $0.50 / $1.50 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $2.50 for Nova 2 Lite.
- Nova 2 Lite accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 128K.
- Magistral Small has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | Amazon |
| Noometry Index | 29.9 | 39.0 |
| Rank | 289 | 161 |
| Context | 128K | 1M |
| Input $/M | $0.50 | $0.30 |
| Output $/M | $1.50 | $2.50 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Magistral Small: 37.8 (#172)
- Nova 2 Lite: 40.1 (#131)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| SciCode | 35.2% | — |
| LMArena Coding | — | 1386 |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Magistral Small: —
- Nova 2 Lite: 23.9 (#114)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 27.1% |

## Reasoning

- Magistral Small: 6.9 (#345)
- Nova 2 Lite: 26.4 (#120)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| ARC-AGI-2 | 0% | — |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 6.3% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 5% | — |
| CritPt | 0.3% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 3% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | — | 1364 |
| DTBench | 61.3% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 133.19 | — |

## Math

- Magistral Small: 24.9 (#253)
- Nova 2 Lite: 34.8 (#154)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 30% | — |
| LMArena Math | — | 1359 |

## Knowledge

- Magistral Small: 30.9 (#215)
- Nova 2 Lite: 42.5 (#88)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 56.1% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 5.1% |
| LMArena Expert | — | 1360 |

## Multilingual

- Magistral Small: —
- Nova 2 Lite: 47.3 (#148)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | — | 1337 |
| LMArena Chinese | — | 1364 |
| LMArena French | — | 1381 |
| LMArena German | — | 1343 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1273 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1284 |
| LMArena Russian | — | 1343 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1372 |

## Instruction Following

- Magistral Small: —
- Nova 2 Lite: 70.7 (#156)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | — | 1335 |

## Long Context

- Magistral Small: —
- Nova 2 Lite: 40.6 (#145)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | — | 1335 |

## Writing & Preference

- Magistral Small: —
- Nova 2 Lite: 54.1 (#150)

| Benchmark | Magistral Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | — | 1362 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | — | 1291 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | — | 1338 |

## FAQ

### Is Magistral Small better than Nova 2 Lite?

Nova 2 Lite is the stronger model overall, scoring 39.0 to 29.9 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, Magistral Small or Nova 2 Lite?

Magistral Small is cheaper. It lists at $0.50 per million input tokens and $1.50 per million output tokens; Nova 2 Lite lists at $0.30 and $2.50.

### Is Magistral Small or Nova 2 Lite better for coding?

Nova 2 Lite scores higher on coding benchmarks: 40.1 versus 37.8 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

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

### How many benchmarks do Magistral Small and Nova 2 Lite share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Magistral Small has 10 scored results on Noometry and Nova 2 Lite has 19.