ZMIME
Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite vs Qwen3 8B vs Mistral Small 3.2

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite comes out ahead, 71 to 60 and 56 on our weighted score, though Mistral Small 3.2 is 14% cheaper per token.

  1. Our pick

    Google

    Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite

    Released Jun 17, 2025

    71/100
    • ECI133.9
    • Price$0.10 / $0.40
    • Context1.05M
    Full specs Remove Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite

  2. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 8B

    Released Apr 28, 2025

    56/100
    • ECI136.2
    • Price$0.18 / $0.70
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 8B

  3. Mistral AI

    Mistral Small 3.2

    Released Jun 20, 2025

    60/100
    • ECI131.7
    • Price$0.10 / $0.30
    • Context128K
    Full specs Remove Mistral Small 3.2
01 — Verdict

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is our pick

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is the better all-round choice, scoring 71/100 against Mistral Small 3.2 (60) and Qwen3 8B (56). It leads on inputs & features and context window. Qwen3 8B wins on capability. Mistral Small 3.2 wins on price. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityQwen3 8BCapabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3 8B 136.2 · Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite 133.9 · Mistral Small 3.2 131.7
  • Lowest priceMistral Small 3.2Mistral Small 3.2 $0.15 · Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite $0.175 · Qwen3 8B $0.31 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextGemini 2.5 Flash-LiteGemini 2.5 Flash-Lite 1,048,576 · Qwen3 8B 131,072 · Mistral Small 3.2 128,000 tokens
  • Widest inputsGemini 2.5 Flash-LiteGemini 2.5 Flash-Lite: Text, Images, PDFs, Audio, Video · Qwen3 8B: Text · Mistral Small 3.2: Text, Images
  • Self-hostingQwen3 8B and Mistral Small 3.2Publishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightGemini 2.5 Flash-LiteQwen3 8BMistral Small 3.2
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%586155
Price25%867489
Inputs & features15%1003550
Context window10%612424
Overall100%71/10056/10060/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite vs Qwen3 8B vs Mistral Small 3.2 specifications side by side
SpecificationGemini 2.5 Flash-LiteGoogleQwen3 8BAlibaba (Qwen)Mistral Small 3.2Mistral AI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)133.9136.2 (best)131.7
ECI rank#118 of 148#113 of 148 (best)#123 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions—56.8% (best)49.1%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics—56.1% (best)30.3%
Price per million tokens
Input$0.10 (best)$0.18$0.10 (best)
Output$0.40$0.70$0.30 (best)
Cached input$0.01——
Blended (3:1)$0.175$0.31$0.15 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Google APIOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial Mistral API
Limits
Context window1,048,576 tokens (best)131,072 tokens128,000 tokens
Max output65,536 tokens (best)8,192 tokens16,384 tokens
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesYesNoYes
PDFsYesNoNo
AudioYesNoNo
VideoYesNoNo
ReasoningYesYesNo
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputYesNoNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpenOpen
API model IDgemini-2.5-flash-liteqwen3-8bmistral-small-2506
API providers20 (best)16
ReleasedJun 17, 2025Apr 28, 2025Jun 20, 2025
Knowledge cutoffJan 2025Apr 2025Mar 2025
03 — Cost

What would a month cost?

Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.

  • Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite$1.80
  • Qwen3 8B$3.20
  • Mistral Small 3.2$1.60
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, Qwen3 8B or Mistral Small 3.2?

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is the better all-round choice, scoring 71/100 against Mistral Small 3.2 (60) and Qwen3 8B (56). It leads on inputs & features and context window. Qwen3 8B wins on capability. Mistral Small 3.2 wins on price. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, Qwen3 8B or Mistral Small 3.2?

Mistral Small 3.2 is cheaper at $0.10 input / $0.30 output per million tokens (official Mistral API price). Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite costs $0.10 input / $0.40 output per million tokens (official Google API price); Qwen3 8B costs $0.18 input / $0.70 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.15 per million tokens for Mistral Small 3.2 versus $0.175 for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite (1.2× as much) and $0.31 for Qwen3 8B (2.1× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Qwen3 8B scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3 8B 136.2 (#113 of 148), Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite 133.9 (#118 of 148) and Mistral Small 3.2 131.7 (#123 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (129.7–138.1 vs 129.8–136.3), so treat the gap as small.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite, Qwen3 8B and Mistral Small 3.2 yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Qwen3 8B leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.

Which has the bigger context window?

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite has the largest context window at 1,048,576 tokens, against 131,072 for Qwen3 8B and 128,000 for Mistral Small 3.2. Maximum output per response: Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite up to 65,536, Qwen3 8B up to 8,192, Mistral Small 3.2 up to 16,384 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite accepts text, images, PDFs, audio and video; Qwen3 8B accepts text; Mistral Small 3.2 accepts text and images. Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Qwen3 8B and Mistral Small 3.2 publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Mistral Small 3.2 is the newest, released Jun 20, 2025. Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite came out Jun 17, 2025; Qwen3 8B came out Apr 28, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Gemini 2.5 Flash-Lite Jan 2025, Qwen3 8B Apr 2025, Mistral Small 3.2 Mar 2025.

How do you decide the winner?

Each model gets a 0–100 score on capability (50%, independent benchmark results); price (25%, blended price per million tokens (3 input : 1 output), log scale); inputs & features (15%, image, PDF, audio and video input, tool calling, structured output and reasoning); context window (10%, maximum tokens per request, log scale). Dimensions missing for any model are dropped and the remaining weights rescaled, so every model is judged on the same evidence. Specs and prices come from public model listings and the labs’ own API pages; capability scores come from independent benchmark runs. Data updated Oct 4, 2026.

05 — Keep comparing

Related comparisons