# MiniMax-M2 vs Mistral Small 3.1

> MiniMax-M2 is the stronger model overall, scoring 36.9 to 31.4 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/minimax-m2-vs-mistral-small-3-1
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 15

## Summary

- They share 15 benchmarks with published results for both. MiniMax-M2 scores higher in 7 categories and Mistral Small 3.1 in 1 category; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where MiniMax-M2 leads 34.6 to 13.7.
- Mistral Small 3.1 is cheaper at $0.35 / $0.56 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $1.20 for MiniMax-M2.
- MiniMax-M2 accepts more context: 205K tokens versus 128K.

## Snapshot

| | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | MiniMax | Mistral AI |
| Noometry Index | 36.9 | 31.4 |
| Rank | 201 | 263 |
| Context | 205K | 128K |
| Input $/M | $0.30 | $0.35 |
| Output $/M | $1.20 | $0.56 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- MiniMax-M2: 39.1 (#151)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 37.7 (#175)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1370 | 1309 |
| SWE-bench Verified (bash only) | 61% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1297 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- MiniMax-M2: 24.9 (#102)
- Mistral Small 3.1: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | 30% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 160.6 | — |

## Reasoning

- MiniMax-M2: 18.6 (#256)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 18.9 (#249)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1357 | 1278 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 57.8% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 14.8% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 1% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 127.48 |

## Math

- MiniMax-M2: 34.6 (#158)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 13.7 (#295)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1350 | 1261 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 3.9% |
| Omni-MATH | — | 24.8% |

## Knowledge

- MiniMax-M2: 36.3 (#160)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 22.6 (#266)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1336 | 1258 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 41.9% |
| MMLU-Pro | — | 61% |
| GPQA (HELM) | — | 39.2% |

## Multimodal

- MiniMax-M2: —
- Mistral Small 3.1: 32.6 (#93)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | — | 1136 |

## Multilingual

- MiniMax-M2: 45.6 (#165)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 41.4 (#204)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1314 | 1255 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1367 | 1254 |
| LMArena French | 1336 | 1270 |
| LMArena German | 1366 | 1266 |
| LMArena Russian | 1332 | 1263 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1326 | 1283 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1210 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1206 |

## Instruction Following

- MiniMax-M2: 70.4 (#160)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 63.8 (#225)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1329 | 1264 |
| IFEval | — | 75% |

## Long Context

- MiniMax-M2: 40.5 (#148)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 39.5 (#172)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1332 | 1300 |

## Writing & Preference

- MiniMax-M2: 53.3 (#157)
- Mistral Small 3.1: 37.2 (#254)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3.1 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1340 | 1278 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1288 | 1253 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1362 | 1270 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | — | 761 |
| WildBench | — | 78.8% |

## FAQ

### Is MiniMax-M2 better than Mistral Small 3.1?

MiniMax-M2 is the stronger model overall, scoring 36.9 to 31.4 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, MiniMax-M2 or Mistral Small 3.1?

Mistral Small 3.1 is cheaper. It lists at $0.35 per million input tokens and $0.56 per million output tokens; MiniMax-M2 lists at $0.30 and $1.20.

### Is MiniMax-M2 or Mistral Small 3.1 better for coding?

MiniMax-M2 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.1 versus 37.7 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

MiniMax-M2 does, with 205K tokens against 128K.

### How many benchmarks do MiniMax-M2 and Mistral Small 3.1 share?

15 benchmarks have published results for both models. MiniMax-M2 has 21 scored results on Noometry and Mistral Small 3.1 has 28.