ZMIME
Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Mistral Small 3.1 24B vs Qwen3 Max

Claude Haiku 4.5 comes out ahead, 58 to 55 and 50 on our weighted score, though Mistral Small 3.1 24B is 7.1× cheaper per token.

  1. Our pick

    Anthropic

    Claude Haiku 4.5

    Released Oct 15, 2025

    58/100
    • ECI142.4
    • Price$1.00 / $5.00
    • Context200K
    Full specs Remove Claude Haiku 4.5

  2. Mistral AI

    Mistral Small 3.1 24B

    Released Mar 17, 2025

    55/100
    • ECI127.5
    • Price$0.229 / $0.436
    • Context128K
    Full specs Remove Mistral Small 3.1 24B

  3. Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3 Max

    Released Sep 23, 2025

    50/100
    • ECI142.4
    • Price$1.20 / $6.00
    • Context262K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3 Max
01 — Verdict

Claude Haiku 4.5 is our pick

Claude Haiku 4.5 is the better all-round choice, scoring 58/100 against Mistral Small 3.1 24B (55) and Qwen3 Max (50). It leads on inputs & features. Mistral Small 3.1 24B wins on price. Qwen3 Max wins on context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityClaude Haiku 4.5Capabilities Index (ECI): Claude Haiku 4.5 142.4 · Qwen3 Max 142.4 · Mistral Small 3.1 24B 127.5
  • Lowest priceMistral Small 3.1 24BMistral Small 3.1 24B $0.281 · Claude Haiku 4.5 $2.00 · Qwen3 Max $2.40 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextQwen3 MaxQwen3 Max 262,144 · Claude Haiku 4.5 200,000 · Mistral Small 3.1 24B 128,000 tokens
  • Widest inputsClaude Haiku 4.5Claude Haiku 4.5: Text, Images, PDFs · Mistral Small 3.1 24B: Text, Images · Qwen3 Max: Text
  • Self-hostingMistral Small 3.1 24BPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightClaude Haiku 4.5Mistral Small 3.1 24BQwen3 Max
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%695068
Price25%367632
Inputs & features15%806025
Context window10%322437
Overall100%58/10055/10050/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Mistral Small 3.1 24B vs Qwen3 Max specifications side by side
SpecificationClaude Haiku 4.5AnthropicMistral Small 3.1 24BMistral AIQwen3 MaxAlibaba (Qwen)
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)142.4 (best)127.5142.4
ECI rank#90 of 148 (best)#132 of 148#91 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions71.2%47.5%72.6% (best)
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics——19.0%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics66.7%5.8%73.3% (best)
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions13.2%—48.8% (best)
Price per million tokens
Input$1.00$0.229 (best)$1.20
Output$5.00$0.436 (best)$6.00
Cached input$0.10——
Blended (3:1)$2.00$0.281 (best)$2.40
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Anthropic APIMedian of 2 providersOfficial Alibaba API
Limits
Context window200,000 tokens128,000 tokens262,144 tokens (best)
Max output64,000 tokens16,384 tokens65,536 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesYesYesNo
PDFsYesNoNo
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningYesNoNo
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputYesYesNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpenProprietary
API model IDclaude-haiku-4-5—qwen3-max
API providers34 (best)216
ReleasedOct 15, 2025Mar 17, 2025Sep 23, 2025
Knowledge cutoffFeb 28, 2025Jun 2024Apr 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.

  • Claude Haiku 4.5$20.00
  • Mistral Small 3.1 24B$3.16
  • Qwen3 Max$24.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Claude Haiku 4.5, Mistral Small 3.1 24B or Qwen3 Max?

Claude Haiku 4.5 is the better all-round choice, scoring 58/100 against Mistral Small 3.1 24B (55) and Qwen3 Max (50). It leads on inputs & features. Mistral Small 3.1 24B wins on price. Qwen3 Max wins on context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Claude Haiku 4.5, Mistral Small 3.1 24B or Qwen3 Max?

Mistral Small 3.1 24B is cheaper at $0.229 input / $0.436 output per million tokens (median across 2 API providers). Claude Haiku 4.5 costs $1.00 input / $5.00 output per million tokens (official Anthropic API price); Qwen3 Max costs $1.20 input / $6.00 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.281 per million tokens for Mistral Small 3.1 24B versus $2.00 for Claude Haiku 4.5 (7.1× as much) and $2.40 for Qwen3 Max (8.6× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Claude Haiku 4.5 scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Claude Haiku 4.5 142.4 (#90 of 148), Qwen3 Max 142.4 (#91 of 148) and Mistral Small 3.1 24B 127.5 (#132 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (139.5–144.3 vs 140.0–144.6), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Qwen3 Max 72.6%, Claude Haiku 4.5 71.2%, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 47.5%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Qwen3 Max 73.3%, Claude Haiku 4.5 66.7%, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 5.8%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Claude Haiku 4.5, Mistral Small 3.1 24B and Qwen3 Max yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Claude Haiku 4.5 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?

Qwen3 Max has the largest context window at 262,144 tokens, against 200,000 for Claude Haiku 4.5 and 128,000 for Mistral Small 3.1 24B. Maximum output per response: Claude Haiku 4.5 up to 64,000, Mistral Small 3.1 24B up to 16,384, Qwen3 Max up to 65,536 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Claude Haiku 4.5 accepts text, images and PDFs; Mistral Small 3.1 24B accepts text and images; Qwen3 Max accepts text. Claude Haiku 4.5 handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Mistral Small 3.1 24B publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Claude Haiku 4.5 and Qwen3 Max is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Claude Haiku 4.5 is the newest, released Oct 15, 2025. Qwen3 Max came out Sep 23, 2025; Mistral Small 3.1 24B came out Mar 17, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Claude Haiku 4.5 Feb 28, 2025, Mistral Small 3.1 24B Jun 2024, Qwen3 Max Apr 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