# Mistral Small 3 vs Step 5 Preview

> Step 5 Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.8 to 30.9 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 25× 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/mistral-small-3-vs-step-5-preview
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 0

## Summary

- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Step 5 Preview leads 38.0 to 18.2.
- Mistral Small 3 is cheaper at $0.05 / $0.08 per million input/output tokens, against $1 / $2.70 for Step 5 Preview.
- Step 5 Preview accepts more context: 1.02M tokens versus 33K.
- Mistral Small 3 has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 30.9 | 43.8 |
| Rank | 268 | 78 |
| Context | 33K | 1.02M |
| Input $/M | $0.05 | $1 |
| Output $/M | $0.08 | $2.70 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Mistral Small 3: 36.0 (#203)
- Step 5 Preview: 50.6 (#40)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena WebDev | — | 1569 |
| SciCode | — | 58.9% |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 45.3% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1246 | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 50.4% | — |

## Reasoning

- Mistral Small 3: 18.2 (#269)
- Step 5 Preview: 38.0 (#58)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | — | 20.9% |
| Chess Puzzles | 0% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1233 | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 127.06 | — |

## Math

- Mistral Small 3: 15.3 (#290)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 6.7% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1240 | — |

## Knowledge

- Mistral Small 3: 25.0 (#258)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 47.3% | — |
| Confabulations | 25.2% | — |
| LMArena Expert | 1202 | — |

## Multilingual

- Mistral Small 3: 37.5 (#231)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1198 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1204 | — |
| LMArena French | 1202 | — |
| LMArena German | 1211 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1111 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1188 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1216 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Mistral Small 3: 63.9 (#224)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1214 | — |

## Long Context

- Mistral Small 3: 37.8 (#206)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1246 | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Mistral Small 3: 32.4 (#275)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small 3 | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1234 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1195 | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 707 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1217 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Mistral Small 3 better than Step 5 Preview?

Step 5 Preview is the stronger model overall, scoring 43.8 to 30.9 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Small 3 costs 25× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Step 5 Preview's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Mistral Small 3 or Step 5 Preview?

Mistral Small 3 is cheaper. It lists at $0.05 per million input tokens and $0.08 per million output tokens; Step 5 Preview lists at $1 and $2.70.

### Is Mistral Small 3 or Step 5 Preview better for coding?

Step 5 Preview scores higher on coding benchmarks: 50.6 versus 36.0 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Step 5 Preview does, with 1.02M tokens against 33K.

### How many benchmarks do Mistral Small 3 and Step 5 Preview share?

0 benchmarks have published results for both models. Mistral Small 3 has 24 scored results on Noometry and Step 5 Preview has 3.