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Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Nova Micro vs Ministral 8B Instruct vs Command R7B

Too close to call on our weighted score (Nova Micro 62, Command R7B 62, Ministral 8B Instruct 57). The right pick depends on what you value most.

  1. Amazon

    Nova Micro

    Released Dec 3, 2024

    62/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.035 / $0.14
    • Context128K
    Full specs Remove Nova Micro

  2. Mistral AI

    Ministral 8B Instruct

    Released Oct 16, 2024

    57/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.15 / $0.15
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove Ministral 8B Instruct

  3. Cohere

    Command R7B

    Released Dec 2, 2024

    62/100
    • ECI—
    • Price$0.037 / $0.15
    • Context128K
    Full specs Remove Command R7B
01 — Verdict

Too close to call

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (Nova Micro 62/100, Command R7B 62/100, Ministral 8B Instruct 57/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Nova Micro on price and Ministral 8B 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 priceNova MicroNova Micro $0.061 · Command R7B $0.066 · Ministral 8B Instruct $0.15 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextMinistral 8B InstructMinistral 8B Instruct 131,072 · Nova Micro 128,000 · Command R7B 128,000 tokens
  • Widest inputsSame inputsNova Micro: Text · Ministral 8B Instruct: Text · Command R7B: Text
  • Self-hostingMinistral 8B Instruct and Command R7BPublishes downloadable weights (Mistral Research License)
How the score is built
MeasureWeightNova MicroMinistral 8B InstructCommand R7B
Price50%10089100
Inputs & features30%252525
Context window20%242424
Overall100%62/10057/10062/100

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.

Nova Micro vs Ministral 8B Instruct vs Command R7B specifications side by side
SpecificationNova MicroAmazonMinistral 8B InstructMistral AICommand R7BCohere
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)———
ECI rank———
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions—27.2%—
Price per million tokens
Input$0.035 (best)$0.15$0.037
Output$0.14 (best)$0.15$0.15
Cached input$0.0088——
Blended (3:1)$0.061 (best)$0.15$0.066
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Amazon Bedrock APIMedian of 1 providersOfficial Cohere API
Limits
Context window128,000 tokens131,072 tokens (best)128,000 tokens
Max output10,000 tokens (best)8,192 tokens4,000 tokens
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesNoNoNo
PDFsNoNoNo
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningNoNoNo
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputNoNoNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryOpenMistral Research LicenseOpen
API model IDamazon.nova-micro-v1:0—command-r7b-12-2024
API providers315 (best)
ReleasedDec 3, 2024Oct 16, 2024Dec 2, 2024
Knowledge cutoffOct 2024—Jun 1, 2024
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.

  • Nova Micro$0.63
  • Ministral 8B Instruct$1.80
  • Command R7B$0.675
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Nova Micro, Ministral 8B Instruct or Command R7B?

It is close. Our weighted score puts them within a point (Nova Micro 62/100, Command R7B 62/100, Ministral 8B Instruct 57/100), so choose by what matters most for your work: Nova Micro on price and Ministral 8B 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, Nova Micro, Ministral 8B Instruct or Command R7B?

Nova Micro is cheaper at $0.035 input / $0.14 output per million tokens (official Amazon Bedrock API price). Command R7B costs $0.037 input / $0.15 output per million tokens (official Cohere API price); Ministral 8B Instruct costs $0.15 input / $0.15 output per million tokens (median across 1 API provider). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.061 per million tokens for Nova Micro versus $0.066 for Command R7B (1.1× as much) and $0.15 for Ministral 8B Instruct (2.4× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

There is no independent benchmark that covers all three models yet. Nova Micro has not been scored yet, Ministral 8B Instruct has not been scored yet and Command R7B has not been scored yet.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Nova Micro, Ministral 8B Instruct and Command R7B yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. Test both on a sample of your own tasks. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.

Which has the bigger context window?

Ministral 8B Instruct has the largest context window at 131,072 tokens, against 128,000 for Nova Micro and 128,000 for Command R7B. Maximum output per response: Nova Micro up to 10,000, Ministral 8B Instruct up to 8,192, Command R7B up to 4,000 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Nova Micro accepts text; Ministral 8B Instruct accepts text; Command R7B accepts text. They handle the same number of input types.

Are any of these open source?

Ministral 8B Instruct and Command R7B publishes its weights (Mistral Research License) and can be self-hosted; Nova Micro is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Nova Micro is the newest, released Dec 3, 2024. Command R7B came out Dec 2, 2024; Ministral 8B Instruct came out Oct 16, 2024. Knowledge cutoff: Nova Micro Oct 2024, Command R7B Jun 1, 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.

05 — Keep comparing

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