Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct vs Gemma 3 12B IT vs Mistral Small 3.1 24B
Too close to call on our weighted score (Gemma 3 12B IT 57, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 55, Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 46). The right pick depends on what you value most.
MetaLlama-3.3-70B-Instruct
46/100- ECI127.3
- Price$0.59 / $0.724
- Context128K
GoogleGemma 3 12B IT
57/100- ECI123.5
- Price$0.05 / $0.15
- Context131K
Mistral AIMistral Small 3.1 24B
55/100- ECI127.5
- Price$0.229 / $0.436
- Context128K
Too close to call
It is close. Our weighted score puts them within 2 points (Gemma 3 12B IT 57/100, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 55/100, Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 46/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Mistral Small 3.1 24B for raw capability, Gemma 3 12B IT on price and Gemma 3 12B IT for long inputs. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
- CapabilityMistral Small 3.1 24BCapabilities Index (ECI): Mistral Small 3.1 24B 127.5 · Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 127.3 · Gemma 3 12B IT 123.5
- Lowest priceGemma 3 12B ITGemma 3 12B IT $0.075 · Mistral Small 3.1 24B $0.281 · Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct $0.624 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
- Longest contextGemma 3 12B ITGemma 3 12B IT 131,072 · Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 128,000 · Mistral Small 3.1 24B 128,000 tokens
- Widest inputsGemma 3 12B IT and Mistral Small 3.1 24BLlama-3.3-70B-Instruct: Text · Gemma 3 12B IT: Text, Images · Mistral Small 3.1 24B: Text, Images
- Self-hostingAll open weightsEvery model here can be downloaded and run on your own hardware
| Measure | Weight | Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct | Gemma 3 12B IT | Mistral Small 3.1 24B |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI) | 50% | 49 | 45 | 50 |
| Price | 25% | 60 | 100 | 76 |
| Inputs & features | 15% | 25 | 50 | 60 |
| Context window | 10% | 24 | 24 | 24 |
| Overall | 100% | 46/100 | 57/100 | 55/100 |
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Llama-3.3-70B-InstructMeta | Gemma 3 12B ITGoogle | Mistral Small 3.1 24BMistral AI |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | 127.3 | 123.5 | 127.5 (best) |
| ECI rank | #133 of 148 | #138 of 148 | #132 of 148 (best) |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 47.4% | 39.5% | 47.5% (best) |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 5.1% | 16.7% (best) | 5.8% |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | $0.59 | $0.05 (best) | $0.229 |
| Output | $0.724 | $0.15 (best) | $0.436 |
| Cached input | — | — | — |
| Blended (3:1) | $0.624 | $0.075 (best) | $0.281 |
| Long-context rate | Same rate | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | Median of 21 providers | Median of 7 providers | Median of 2 providers |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 128,000 tokens | 131,072 tokens (best) | 128,000 tokens |
| Max output | 4,096 tokens | 131,072 tokens (best) | 16,384 tokens |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | No | Yes | Yes |
| PDFs | No | No | No |
| Audio | No | No | No |
| Video | No | No | No |
| Reasoning | No | No | No |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | No | No | Yes |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | Open | Open | Open |
| API model ID | llama-3.3-70b-instruct | — | — |
| API providers | 24 (best) | 7 | 2 |
| Released | Dec 6, 2024 | Mar 12, 2025 | Mar 17, 2025 |
| Knowledge cutoff | Dec 2023 | Aug 2024 | Jun 2024 |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct$7.35
- Gemma 3 12B IT$0.80
- Mistral Small 3.1 24B$3.16
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct, Gemma 3 12B IT or Mistral Small 3.1 24B?
It is close. Our weighted score puts them within 2 points (Gemma 3 12B IT 57/100, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 55/100, Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 46/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Mistral Small 3.1 24B for raw capability, Gemma 3 12B IT on price and Gemma 3 12B IT for long inputs. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
Which is cheaper, Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct, Gemma 3 12B IT or Mistral Small 3.1 24B?
Gemma 3 12B IT is cheaper at $0.05 input / $0.15 output per million tokens (median across 7 API providers). Mistral Small 3.1 24B costs $0.229 input / $0.436 output per million tokens (median across 2 API providers); Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct costs $0.59 input / $0.724 output per million tokens (median across 21 API providers; free on Llama). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.075 per million tokens for Gemma 3 12B IT versus $0.281 for Mistral Small 3.1 24B (3.7× as much) and $0.624 for Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct (8.3× as much).
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
Mistral Small 3.1 24B scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Mistral Small 3.1 24B 127.5 (#132 of 148), Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 127.3 (#133 of 148) and Gemma 3 12B IT 123.5 (#138 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (122.6–129.4 vs 122.5–129.5), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Mistral Small 3.1 24B 47.5%, Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 47.4%, Gemma 3 12B IT 39.5%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Gemma 3 12B IT 16.7%, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 5.8%, Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct 5.1%.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct, Gemma 3 12B IT and Mistral Small 3.1 24B yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Mistral Small 3.1 24B 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?
Gemma 3 12B IT has the largest context window at 131,072 tokens, against 128,000 for Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct and 128,000 for Mistral Small 3.1 24B. Maximum output per response: Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct up to 4,096, Gemma 3 12B IT up to 131,072, Mistral Small 3.1 24B up to 16,384 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct accepts text; Gemma 3 12B IT accepts text and images; Mistral Small 3.1 24B accepts text and images. Gemma 3 12B IT handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
Yes, all three publish their weights, so you can self-host them.
Which is newer?
Mistral Small 3.1 24B is the newest, released Mar 17, 2025. Gemma 3 12B IT came out Mar 12, 2025; Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct came out Dec 6, 2024. Knowledge cutoff: Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct Dec 2023, Gemma 3 12B IT Aug 2024, Mistral Small 3.1 24B Jun 2024.
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.
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