# Mistral Small vs Step 2 16k Exp 202412

> Step 2 16k Exp 202412 is the stronger model overall, scoring 38.6 to 33.1 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/mistral-small-vs-step-2-16k-exp-202412
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 12

## Summary

- They share 12 benchmarks with published results for both. Mistral Small scores higher in 3 categories and Step 2 16k Exp 202412 in 5 categories; 6 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Step 2 16k Exp 202412 leads 33.6 to 15.4.
- Mistral Small has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 33.1 | 38.6 |
| Rank | 238 | 173 |
| Context | 256K | — |
| Input $/M | $0.15 | — |
| Output $/M | $0.60 | — |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Mistral Small: 33.5 (#242)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 37.9 (#170)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1363 | 1316 |
| SciCode | 26.5% | — |
| BigCodeBench Instruct | 36.1% | — |
| LiveBench Coding | 36.2% | — |
| BigCodeBench Complete | 46.6% | — |
| ALE-Bench | 497.62 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Mistral Small: 27.9 (#87)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | 37.1% | — |

## Reasoning

- Mistral Small: 19.3 (#238)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 24.8 (#140)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1336 | 1299 |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 37.8% | — |
| CritPt | 0% | — |
| LiveBench Reasoning | 44.8% | — |
| DTBench | 70.9% | — |
| LiveBench Data Analysis | 53.7% | — |
| LMCA | 20.6% | — |
| LiveBench | 44% | — |

## Math

- Mistral Small: 15.4 (#287)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 33.6 (#171)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1341 | 1305 |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 5.8% | — |
| LiveBench Math | 39.9% | — |
| MATH Level 5 | 46.8% | — |

## Knowledge

- Mistral Small: 30.9 (#214)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 34.6 (#187)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1293 | 1279 |
| GPQA Diamond | 47.5% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 5.1% | — |
| MMLU | 68.7% | — |

## Multimodal

- Mistral Small: 32.9 (#91)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: —

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1142 | — |

## Multilingual

- Mistral Small: 45.7 (#164)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 43.9 (#176)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1315 | 1290 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1342 | 1331 |
| LMArena Russian | 1324 | 1324 |
| LMArena French | 1337 | — |
| LMArena German | 1341 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1275 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1260 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1346 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Mistral Small: 66.6 (#204)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 68.1 (#187)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1310 | 1287 |
| LiveBench Instruction Following | 63.7% | — |

## Long Context

- Mistral Small: 40.4 (#151)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 39.7 (#165)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1327 | 1307 |

## Writing & Preference

- Mistral Small: 52.6 (#165)
- Step 2 16k Exp 202412: 52.5 (#168)

| Benchmark | Mistral Small | Step 2 16k Exp 202412 |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1338 | 1321 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1304 | 1328 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1344 | 1292 |
| LiveBench Language | 30.5% | — |

## FAQ

### Is Mistral Small better than Step 2 16k Exp 202412?

Step 2 16k Exp 202412 is the stronger model overall, scoring 38.6 to 33.1 on the Noometry Index.

### Is Mistral Small or Step 2 16k Exp 202412 better for coding?

Step 2 16k Exp 202412 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 37.9 versus 33.5 in the Noometry coding category.

### How many benchmarks do Mistral Small and Step 2 16k Exp 202412 share?

12 benchmarks have published results for both models. Mistral Small has 39 scored results on Noometry and Step 2 16k Exp 202412 has 12.