Model comparison

Mistral Large 3 vs Mistral Medium 3.5

Mistral Medium 3.5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 40.2 to 39.1 on the Noometry Index. Mistral Large 3 costs 8.0× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Mistral Medium 3.5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified October 10, 2026. 20 shared benchmarks.

Mistral Large 3

Mistral AI

39.1

Rank #176 Confirmed

Mistral Medium 3.5

Mistral AI

40.2

Rank #152 Confirmed

Summary

They share 20 benchmarks with published results for both. Mistral Large 3 scores higher in 2 categories and Mistral Medium 3.5 in 7 categories; 4 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
The widest gap is in knowledge, where Mistral Medium 3.5 leads 40.0 to 36.0.
The biggest single-benchmark swing is Kagi LLM Benchmark: 50.9% for Mistral Large 3 and 41.4% for Mistral Medium 3.5.
Mistral Large 3 is cheaper at $0.25 / $0.75 per million input/output tokens, against $1.50 / $7.50 for Mistral Medium 3.5.

Side by side

Mistral Large 3 and Mistral Medium 3.5 specifications
	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
Provider	Mistral AI	Mistral AI
Noometry Index	39.1	40.2
Released	2025-12-02	—
Weights	Open	Open
Context window	262K	262K
Max output	8K	210K
Input $ / M tokens	$0.25	$1.50
Output $ / M tokens	$0.75	$7.50
Results tracked	24	22

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Category by category

Coding Mistral Medium 3.5 leads

Mistral Large 3: 34.4 (#237), Mistral Medium 3.5: 36.0 (#213)

Coding benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena WebDev	1230	1264
LMArena Coding	1448	1461

Reasoning Mistral Medium 3.5 leads

Mistral Large 3: 15.2 (#319), Mistral Medium 3.5: 17.3 (#295)

Reasoning benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
Kagi LLM Benchmark	50.9%	41.4%
NYT Connections (extended)	7.5%	12.9%
LMArena Hard Prompts	1429	1436
Thematic Generalization	23%	—
Epoch Capabilities Index	—	141.35

Math Too close to call

Mistral Large 3: 38.7 (#129), Mistral Medium 3.5: 39.1 (#113)

Math benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Math	1414	1431

Knowledge Mistral Medium 3.5 leads

Mistral Large 3: 36.0 (#177), Mistral Medium 3.5: 40.0 (#126)

Knowledge benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Expert	1421	1432
Vectara Hallucination Rate	14.5%	—

Multimodal Too close to call

Mistral Large 3: 38.2 (#66), Mistral Medium 3.5: 38.3 (#65)

Multimodal benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Vision	1221	1223

Multilingual Too close to call

Mistral Large 3: 52.5 (#84), Mistral Medium 3.5: 51.9 (#100)

Multilingual benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Non-English	1413	1404
LMArena Chinese	1447	1442
LMArena French	1455	1448
LMArena German	1437	1451
LMArena Korean	1384	1385
LMArena Russian	1411	1395
LMArena Spanish	1440	1409
LMArena Japanese	1394	—

Instruction Following Too close to call

Mistral Large 3: 74.0 (#108), Mistral Medium 3.5: 74.6 (#90)

Instruction Following benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Instruction Following	1403	1415

Long Context Too close to call

Mistral Large 3: 43.1 (#105), Mistral Medium 3.5: 43.2 (#103)

Long Context benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Longer Query	1413	1415

Writing & Preference Mistral Large 3 leads

Mistral Large 3: 60.0 (#101), Mistral Medium 3.5: 58.5 (#117)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
Benchmark	Mistral Large 3	Mistral Medium 3.5
LMArena Text	1428	1421
LMArena Creative Writing	1386	1374
LMArena Multi-Turn	1429	1423
EQ-Bench Creative Writing	1412	—
EQ-Bench 4	—	993

Frequently asked questions

Is Mistral Large 3 better than Mistral Medium 3.5?

Which is cheaper, Mistral Large 3 or Mistral Medium 3.5?

Mistral Large 3 is cheaper. It lists at $0.25 per million input tokens and $0.75 per million output tokens; Mistral Medium 3.5 lists at $1.50 and $7.50.

Is Mistral Large 3 or Mistral Medium 3.5 better for coding?

Mistral Medium 3.5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 36.0 versus 34.4 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Both accept 262K tokens.

How many benchmarks do Mistral Large 3 and Mistral Medium 3.5 share?

20 benchmarks have published results for both models. Mistral Large 3 has 24 scored results on Noometry and Mistral Medium 3.5 has 22.