ZMIME
Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Mercury Edit 2 vs Mistral Small 4 vs Trinity Large Thinking

Mistral Small 4 comes out ahead, 64 to 55 and 35 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.

  1. Inception

    Mercury Edit 2

    Released Mar 30, 2026

    35/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.25 / $0.75
    • Context32K
  2. Our pick

    Mistral AI

    Mistral Small 4

    Released Mar 16, 2026

    64/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.15 / $0.60
    • Context256K
  3. Arcee AI

    Trinity Large Thinking

    Released Apr 1, 2026Beta

    55/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.25 / $0.80
    • Context524K
01 — Verdict

Mistral Small 4 is our pick

Mistral Small 4 is the better all-round choice, scoring 64/100 against Trinity Large Thinking (55) and Mercury Edit 2 (35). It leads on price and inputs & features. Trinity Large Thinking wins on context window. 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 priceMistral Small 4Mistral Small 4 $0.263 · Mercury Edit 2 $0.375 · Trinity Large Thinking $0.388 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextTrinity Large ThinkingTrinity Large Thinking 524,288 · Mistral Small 4 256,000 · Mercury Edit 2 32,000 tokens
  • Widest inputsMistral Small 4Mercury Edit 2: Text · Mistral Small 4: Text, Images · Trinity Large Thinking: Text
  • Self-hostingMistral Small 4 and Trinity Large ThinkingPublishes downloadable weights (OpenMDW-1.1)
How the score is built
MeasureWeightMercury Edit 2Mistral Small 4Trinity Large Thinking
Price50%707769
Inputs & features30%06035
Context window20%03649
Overall100%35/10064/10055/100

Left out because at least one model lacks the data: capability. The remaining weights were rescaled.

02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Mercury Edit 2 vs Mistral Small 4 vs Trinity Large Thinking specifications side by side
SpecificationMercury Edit 2InceptionMistral Small 4Mistral AITrinity Large ThinkingArcee AI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)———
ECI rank———
Price per million tokens
Input$0.25$0.15 (best)$0.25
Output$0.75$0.60 (best)$0.80
Cached input$0.025$0.015 (best)$0.06
Blended (3:1)$0.375$0.263 (best)$0.388
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Inception APIOfficial Mistral APIOfficial Arcee API
Limits
Context window32,000 tokens256,000 tokens524,288 tokens (best)
Max output8,192 tokens256,000 tokens262,144 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesNoYesNo
PDFsNoNoNo
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningNoYeshighYes
Tool callingNoYesYes
Structured outputNoNoNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpenOpenOpenMDW-1.1
API model IDmercury-edit-2mistral-small-2603trinity-large-thinking
API providers116 (best)6
ReleasedMar 30, 2026Mar 16, 2026Apr 1, 2026
Knowledge cutoff—Jun 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.

  • Mercury Edit 2$4.00
  • Mistral Small 4$2.70
  • Trinity Large Thinking$4.10
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Mercury Edit 2, Mistral Small 4 or Trinity Large Thinking?

Mistral Small 4 is the better all-round choice, scoring 64/100 against Trinity Large Thinking (55) and Mercury Edit 2 (35). It leads on price and inputs & features. Trinity Large Thinking wins on context window. 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, Mercury Edit 2, Mistral Small 4 or Trinity Large Thinking?

Mistral Small 4 is cheaper at $0.15 input / $0.60 output per million tokens (official Mistral API price). Mercury Edit 2 costs $0.25 input / $0.75 output per million tokens (official Inception API price); Trinity Large Thinking costs $0.25 input / $0.80 output per million tokens (official Arcee API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.263 per million tokens for Mistral Small 4 versus $0.375 for Mercury Edit 2 (1.4× as much) and $0.388 for Trinity Large Thinking (1.5× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. Mercury Edit 2 has not been scored yet, Mistral Small 4 has not been scored yet and Trinity Large Thinking has not been scored yet.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Mercury Edit 2, Mistral Small 4 and Trinity Large Thinking yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. Test both on a sample of your own tasks. Note that Mercury Edit 2 does not support tool calling, which most coding agents need.

Which has the bigger context window?

Trinity Large Thinking has the largest context window at 524,288 tokens, against 256,000 for Mistral Small 4 and 32,000 for Mercury Edit 2. Maximum output per response: Mercury Edit 2 up to 8,192, Mistral Small 4 up to 256,000, Trinity Large Thinking up to 262,144 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Mercury Edit 2 accepts text; Mistral Small 4 accepts text and images; Trinity Large Thinking accepts text. Mistral Small 4 handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Mistral Small 4 and Trinity Large Thinking publishes its weights (OpenMDW-1.1) and can be self-hosted; Mercury Edit 2 is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Trinity Large Thinking is the newest, released Apr 1, 2026. Mercury Edit 2 came out Mar 30, 2026; Mistral Small 4 came out Mar 16, 2026. Knowledge cutoff: Mistral Small 4 Jun 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.