# MiniMax-M2 vs Mistral Small 3

> MiniMax-M2 is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.4 to 31.2 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 9.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when MiniMax-M2's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/minimax-m2-vs-mistral-small-3
- Last updated: 2026-10-11
- Shared benchmarks: 14

## Summary

- They share 14 benchmarks with published results for both. MiniMax-M2 scores higher in 8 categories and Mistral Small 3 in 0 categories; 7 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where MiniMax-M2 leads 37.3 to 16.3.
- Mistral Small 3 is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.08 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $1.20 for MiniMax-M2.
- MiniMax-M2 accepts more context: 205K tokens versus 33K.

## Snapshot

| | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | MiniMax | Mistral AI |
| Noometry Index | 37.4 | 31.2 |
| Rank | 204 | 278 |
| Context | 205K | 33K |
| Input $/M | $0.30 | $0.05 |
| Output $/M | $1.20 | $0.08 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- MiniMax-M2: 39.3 (#159)
- Mistral Small 3: 36.5 (#207)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1370 | 1246 |
| SWE-bench Verified (bash only) | 61% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1297 | — |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | — | 45.3% |
| BigCodeBench Complete | — | 50.4% |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- MiniMax-M2: 25.1 (#109)
- Mistral Small 3: —

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench | 30% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | 160.6 | — |

## Reasoning

- MiniMax-M2: 19.4 (#258)
- Mistral Small 3: 18.9 (#273)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1357 | 1233 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 57.8% | — |
| NYT Connections (extended) | 14.8% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | — | 0% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | — | 127.07 |

## Math

- MiniMax-M2: 37.3 (#160)
- Mistral Small 3: 16.3 (#295)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1352 | 1240 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | — | 6.7% |

## Knowledge

- MiniMax-M2: 37.0 (#163)
- Mistral Small 3: 25.1 (#263)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1337 | 1202 |
| GPQA Diamond | — | 47.3% |
| Confabulations | — | 25.2% |

## Multilingual

- MiniMax-M2: 45.3 (#171)
- Mistral Small 3: 37.3 (#236)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1313 | 1198 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1366 | 1204 |
| LMArena French | 1335 | 1203 |
| LMArena German | 1355 | 1211 |
| LMArena Russian | 1331 | 1216 |
| LMArena Japanese | — | 1111 |
| LMArena Korean | — | 1188 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1326 | — |

## Instruction Following

- MiniMax-M2: 70.2 (#166)
- Mistral Small 3: 63.7 (#229)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1328 | 1214 |

## Long Context

- MiniMax-M2: 40.5 (#153)
- Mistral Small 3: 37.8 (#211)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1331 | 1246 |

## Writing & Preference

- MiniMax-M2: 53.0 (#162)
- Mistral Small 3: 32.2 (#280)

| Benchmark | MiniMax-M2 | Mistral Small 3 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1340 | 1234 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1286 | 1195 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1361 | 1217 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | — | 707 |

## FAQ

### Is MiniMax-M2 better than Mistral Small 3?

MiniMax-M2 is the stronger model overall, scoring 37.4 to 31.2 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 9.1× less per token, which makes it the better buy when MiniMax-M2's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, MiniMax-M2 or Mistral Small 3?

Mistral Small 3 is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.08 per million output tokens; MiniMax-M2 lists at $0.30 and $1.20.

### Is MiniMax-M2 or Mistral Small 3 better for coding?

MiniMax-M2 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.3 versus 36.5 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

MiniMax-M2 does, with 205K tokens against 33K.

### How many benchmarks do MiniMax-M2 and Mistral Small 3 share?

14 benchmarks have published results for both models. MiniMax-M2 has 21 scored results on Noometry and Mistral Small 3 has 24.