ZMIME
Comparison · 2 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Qwen3.5 9B vs Mistral Medium 3

Qwen3.5 9B comes out ahead, 72 to 53 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.

  1. Our pick

    Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3.5 9B

    Released Feb 23, 2026

    72/100
    • ECI139.5
    • Price$0.10 / $0.15
    • Context262K
    Full specs Remove Qwen3.5 9B

  2. Mistral AI

    Mistral Medium 3

    Released May 7, 2025

    53/100
    • ECI134.1
    • Price$0.40 / $2.00
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove Mistral Medium 3

  3. Add a model

    Make it a three-way comparison.

01 — Verdict

Qwen3.5 9B is our pick

Qwen3.5 9B is the better all-round choice, scoring 72/100 against Mistral Medium 3 (53). It leads on capability, price, inputs & features and context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityQwen3.5 9BCapabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.5 9B 139.5 · Mistral Medium 3 134.1
  • Lowest priceQwen3.5 9BQwen3.5 9B $0.113 · Mistral Medium 3 $0.80 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextQwen3.5 9BQwen3.5 9B 262,144 · Mistral Medium 3 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsQwen3.5 9BQwen3.5 9B: Text, Images, Video · Mistral Medium 3: Text, Images
  • Self-hostingQwen3.5 9BPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightQwen3.5 9BMistral Medium 3
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%6558
Price25%9554
Inputs & features15%8050
Context window10%3724
Overall100%72/10053/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Qwen3.5 9B vs Mistral Medium 3 specifications side by side
SpecificationQwen3.5 9BAlibaba (Qwen)Mistral Medium 3Mistral AI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)139.5 (best)134.1
ECI rank#101 of 148 (best)#117 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions79.0% (best)59.5%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics61.7% (best)32.2%
Price per million tokens
Input$0.10 (best)$0.40
Output$0.15 (best)$2.00
Cached input——
Blended (3:1)$0.113 (best)$0.80
Long-context rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceMedian of 14 providersOfficial Mistral API
Limits
Context window262,144 tokens (best)131,072 tokens
Max output65,536 tokens131,072 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYes
ImagesYesYes
PDFsNoNo
AudioNoNo
VideoYesNo
ReasoningYesNo
Tool callingYesYes
Structured outputYesNo
Availability
WeightsOpenProprietary
API model ID—mistral-medium-2505
API providers15 (best)5
ReleasedFeb 23, 2026May 7, 2025
Knowledge cutoff—May 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.

  • Qwen3.5 9B$1.30
  • Mistral Medium 3$8.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Qwen3.5 9B or Mistral Medium 3?

Qwen3.5 9B is the better all-round choice, scoring 72/100 against Mistral Medium 3 (53). It leads on capability, price, inputs & features and context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Qwen3.5 9B or Mistral Medium 3?

Qwen3.5 9B is cheaper at $0.10 input / $0.15 output per million tokens (median across 14 API providers). Mistral Medium 3 costs $0.40 input / $2.00 output per million tokens (official Mistral API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.113 per million tokens for Qwen3.5 9B versus $0.80 for Mistral Medium 3 (7.1× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Qwen3.5 9B scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.5 9B 139.5 (#101 of 148) and Mistral Medium 3 134.1 (#117 of 148). Their confidence ranges do not overlap (136.5–141.3 vs 130.5–135.6), so the gap is a real one. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Qwen3.5 9B 79.0%, Mistral Medium 3 59.5%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Qwen3.5 9B 61.7%, Mistral Medium 3 32.2%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Qwen3.5 9B and Mistral Medium 3 yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Qwen3.5 9B leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. Both support tool calling for agent workflows.

Which has the bigger context window?

Qwen3.5 9B has the largest context window at 262,144 tokens, against 131,072 for Mistral Medium 3. Maximum output per response: Qwen3.5 9B up to 65,536, Mistral Medium 3 up to 131,072 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Qwen3.5 9B accepts text, images and video; Mistral Medium 3 accepts text and images. Qwen3.5 9B handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

Qwen3.5 9B publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Mistral Medium 3 is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Qwen3.5 9B is the newest, released Feb 23, 2026. Mistral Medium 3 came out May 7, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Mistral Medium 3 May 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

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