Magistral Medium vs Sonar Deep Research vs Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
Too close to call on our weighted score (Magistral Medium 30, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct 28, Sonar Deep Research 20). The right pick depends on what you value most.
Mistral AIMagistral Medium
30/100- ECI—
- Price$2.00 / $5.00
- Context128K
PerplexitySonar Deep Research
20/100- ECI—
- Price$2.00 / $8.00
- Context128K
Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct
28/100- ECI—
- Price$1.50 / $7.50
- Context262K
Too close to call
It is close. Our weighted score puts them within 1 points (Magistral Medium 30/100, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct 28/100, Sonar Deep Research 20/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Magistral Medium on price and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct for long inputs. The score weighs price 50%, inputs & features 30%, context window 20%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.
- CapabilityNot enough dataNo independent benchmark covers every model here yet
- Lowest priceMagistral MediumMagistral Medium $2.75 · Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct $3.00 · Sonar Deep Research $3.50 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
- Longest contextQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct 262,144 · Magistral Medium 128,000 · Sonar Deep Research 128,000 tokens
- Widest inputsSame inputsMagistral Medium: Text · Sonar Deep Research: Text · Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct: Text
- Self-hostingQwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructPublishes downloadable weights
| Measure | Weight | Magistral Medium | Sonar Deep Research | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Price | 50% | 29 | 24 | 27 |
| Inputs & features | 30% | 35 | 10 | 25 |
| Context window | 20% | 24 | 24 | 37 |
| Overall | 100% | 30/100 | 20/100 | 28/100 |
Left out because at least one model lacks the data: capability. The remaining weights were rescaled.
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Magistral MediumMistral AI | Sonar Deep ResearchPerplexity | Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B InstructAlibaba (Qwen) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | — | — | — |
| ECI rank | — | — | — |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | $2.00 | $2.00 | $1.50 (best) |
| Output | $5.00 (best) | $8.00 | $7.50 |
| Cached input | — | — | — |
| Blended (3:1) | $2.75 (best) | $3.50 | $3.00 |
| Long-context rate | Same rate | Same rate | Over 32K: $2.70 / $13.50 |
| Price source | Official Mistral API | Official Perplexity API | Official Alibaba API |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 128,000 tokens | 128,000 tokens | 262,144 tokens (best) |
| Max output | 16,384 tokens | 32,768 tokens | 65,536 tokens (best) |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | No | No | No |
| PDFs | No | No | No |
| Audio | No | No | No |
| Video | No | No | No |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yesminimal · low · medium · high | No |
| Tool calling | Yes | No | Yes |
| Structured output | No | No | No |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | Proprietary | Proprietary | Open |
| API model ID | magistral-medium-latest | sonar-deep-research | qwen3-coder-480b-a35b-instruct |
| API providers | 4 | 3 | 7 (best) |
| Released | Mar 17, 2025 | Feb 1, 2025 | Apr 2025 |
| Knowledge cutoff | Jun 2025 | Jan 2025 | Apr 2025 |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Magistral Medium$30.00
- Sonar Deep Research$36.00
- Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct$30.00
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Magistral Medium, Sonar Deep Research or Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct?
It is close. Our weighted score puts them within 1 points (Magistral Medium 30/100, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct 28/100, Sonar Deep Research 20/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Magistral Medium on price and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct for long inputs. The score weighs price 50%, inputs & features 30%, context window 20%. None of the shared benchmarks cover every model here yet, so capability is left out of this verdict.
Which is cheaper, Magistral Medium, Sonar Deep Research or Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct?
Magistral Medium is cheaper at $2.00 input / $5.00 output per million tokens (official Mistral API price). Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct costs $1.50 input / $7.50 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price); Sonar Deep Research costs $2.00 input / $8.00 output per million tokens (official Perplexity API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $2.75 per million tokens for Magistral Medium versus $3.00 for Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct (1.1× as much) and $3.50 for Sonar Deep Research (1.3× as much).
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. Magistral Medium has not been scored yet, Sonar Deep Research has not been scored yet and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct has not been scored yet.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Magistral Medium, Sonar Deep Research and Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. Test both on a sample of your own tasks. Note that Sonar Deep Research does not support tool calling, which most coding agents need.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct has the largest context window at 262,144 tokens, against 128,000 for Magistral Medium and 128,000 for Sonar Deep Research. Maximum output per response: Magistral Medium up to 16,384, Sonar Deep Research up to 32,768, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct up to 65,536 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Magistral Medium accepts text; Sonar Deep Research accepts text; Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct accepts text. They handle the same number of input types.
Are any of these open source?
Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Magistral Medium and Sonar Deep Research is proprietary.
Which is newer?
Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct is the newest, released Apr 2025. Magistral Medium came out Mar 17, 2025; Sonar Deep Research came out Feb 1, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Magistral Medium Jun 2025, Sonar Deep Research Jan 2025, Qwen3-Coder 480B-A35B Instruct 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.
