# Ministral 3B vs Step 5 Preview

> Step 5 Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.9 to 26.2 on the Noometry Index. Ministral 3B costs 14× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Step 5 Preview's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/ministral-3b-vs-step-5-preview
- Last updated: 2026-10-11
- Shared benchmarks: 0

## Summary

- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Step 5 Preview leads 41.2 to 10.4.
- Ministral 3B is cheaper at $0.10 / $0.10 per million input/output tokens, against $1 / $2.70 for Step 5 Preview.
- Step 5 Preview accepts more context: 1.02M tokens versus 131K.
- Ministral 3B has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 26.2 | 47.9 |
| Rank | 338 | 58 |
| Context | 131K | 1.02M |
| Input $/M | $0.10 | $1 |
| Output $/M | $0.10 | $2.70 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Ministral 3B: —
- Step 5 Preview: 51.8 (#36)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1564 |
| SciCode | — | 58.9% |
| LMArena Coding | — | 1480 |

## Reasoning

- Ministral 3B: 18.4 (#282)
- Step 5 Preview: 40.0 (#57)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | — | 20.9% |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | — | 1465 |
| DTBench | 51.7% | — |
| LMCA | 5.5% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 118.1 | — |

## Math

- Ministral 3B: 26.6 (#258)
- Step 5 Preview: 46.1 (#72)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| ProofBench | — | 42% |
| LMArena Math | — | 1470 |
| MATH Level 5 | 14.4% | — |

## Knowledge

- Ministral 3B: 10.4 (#302)
- Step 5 Preview: 41.2 (#112)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 25.3% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 7.3% | — |
| LMArena Expert | — | 1470 |

## Multimodal

- Ministral 3B: —
- Step 5 Preview: 41.0 (#41)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | — | 1267 |

## Multilingual

- Ministral 3B: —
- Step 5 Preview: 53.8 (#54)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | — | 1432 |
| LMArena Chinese | — | 1519 |
| LMArena Russian | — | 1436 |
| LMArena Spanish | — | 1439 |

## Instruction Following

- Ministral 3B: —
- Step 5 Preview: 76.0 (#50)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | — | 1444 |

## Long Context

- Ministral 3B: —
- Step 5 Preview: 44.5 (#64)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | — | 1455 |

## Writing & Preference

- Ministral 3B: —
- Step 5 Preview: 62.8 (#71)

| Benchmark | Ministral 3B | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | — | 1442 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | — | 1410 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | — | 1447 |

## FAQ

### Is Ministral 3B better than Step 5 Preview?

Step 5 Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 47.9 to 26.2 on the Noometry Index. Ministral 3B costs 14× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Step 5 Preview's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Ministral 3B or Step 5 Preview?

Ministral 3B is cheaper. It lists at $0.10 per million input tokens and $0.10 per million output tokens; Step 5 Preview lists at $1 and $2.70.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Step 5 Preview does, with 1.02M tokens against 131K.

### How many benchmarks do Ministral 3B and Step 5 Preview share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Ministral 3B has 6 scored results on Noometry and Step 5 Preview has 18.