Mistral Small 3 vs o3 Mini
How do these models stack up? Below is an expert side-by-side comparison of specifications, context window capacity, live pricing per million tokens, and standardized benchmark scores for Mistral Small 3 and o3 Mini.
Mistral Small 3
Mistral Small 3 is a 24B-parameter language model optimized for low-latency performance across common AI tasks. Released under the Apache 2.0 license, it features both pre-trained and instruction-tuned versions designed...
o3 Mini
OpenAI o3-mini is a cost-efficient language model optimized for STEM reasoning tasks, particularly excelling in science, mathematics, and coding. This model supports the `reasoning_effort` parameter, which can be set to...
Technical Specifications
| Specification | Mistral Small 3 | o3 Mini |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral | OpenAI |
| Context Window | 32,768 tokens | 200,000 tokens |
| Agent Suitability | 84/100 | 91/100 |
| Time to First Token (TTFT) | 120 ms | 800 ms |
| Deployment Model | managed api | managed api |
| Production Stability | stable | stable |
| API Available | Yes | Yes |
| Released Date | 2025-01-30 | 2025-01-31 |
API Pricing Comparison
Input Price per Million Tokens
Mistral Small 3
$0.07
o3 Mini
$1.10
Output Price per Million Tokens
Mistral Small 3
$0.20
o3 Mini
$4.40
Want to test both models live?
Run side-by-side prompt prompts in our dynamic Sandbox. Check execution speeds, latency metrics, and compute actual costs in real-time.
Benchmark Performance Metrics
Scores show the raw performance percentages verified across key evaluation suites. Higher bars indicate superior accuracy and capability in that domain.
Mistral Small 3 Quirks & Gotchas
- ▸Fastest TTFT at lowest cost — ideal for high-volume classification
- ▸Not designed for complex reasoning — route multi-step tasks to Mistral Large 3
o3 Mini Quirks & Gotchas
- ▸Best cost/performance ratio for reasoning tasks in the OpenAI lineup
- ▸Still slower than GPT-5 for simple tool calls — route accordingly