ZMIME
Comparison · 2 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Qwen3.5 Plus vs Mistral Medium 3

Qwen3.5 Plus comes out ahead, 66 to 53 on our weighted score, though Mistral Medium 3 is 11% cheaper per token.

  1. Our pick

    Alibaba (Qwen)

    Qwen3.5 Plus

    Released Feb 16, 2026

    66/100
    • ECI146.8
    • Price$0.40 / $2.40
    • Context1M
  2. Mistral AI

    Mistral Medium 3

    Released May 7, 2025

    53/100
    • ECI134.1
    • Price$0.40 / $2.00
    • Context131K
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01 — Verdict

Qwen3.5 Plus is our pick

Qwen3.5 Plus is the better all-round choice, scoring 66/100 against Mistral Medium 3 (53). It leads on capability, inputs & features and context window. Mistral Medium 3 wins on price. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityQwen3.5 PlusCapabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.5 Plus 146.8 · Mistral Medium 3 134.1
  • Lowest priceMistral Medium 3Mistral Medium 3 $0.80 · Qwen3.5 Plus $0.90 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextQwen3.5 PlusQwen3.5 Plus 1,000,000 · Mistral Medium 3 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsQwen3.5 PlusQwen3.5 Plus: Text, Images, Video · Mistral Medium 3: Text, Images
  • Self-hostingNo open weightsBoth are available only through APIs
How the score is built
MeasureWeightQwen3.5 PlusMistral Medium 3
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%7458
Price25%5254
Inputs & features15%7050
Context window10%6024
Overall100%66/10053/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Qwen3.5 Plus vs Mistral Medium 3 specifications side by side
SpecificationQwen3.5 PlusAlibaba (Qwen)Mistral Medium 3Mistral AI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)146.8 (best)134.1
ECI rank#65 of 148 (best)#117 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions84.9% (best)59.5%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics86.7% (best)32.2%
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions25.4%—
Price per million tokens
Input$0.40$0.40
Output$2.40$2.00 (best)
Cached input——
Blended (3:1)$0.90$0.80 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceOfficial Alibaba APIOfficial Mistral API
Limits
Context window1,000,000 tokens (best)131,072 tokens
Max output65,536 tokens131,072 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYes
ImagesYesYes
PDFsNoNo
AudioNoNo
VideoYesNo
ReasoningYesNo
Tool callingYesYes
Structured outputNoNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryProprietary
API model IDqwen3.5-plusmistral-medium-2505
API providers10 (best)5
ReleasedFeb 16, 2026May 7, 2025
Knowledge cutoffApr 2025May 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 Plus$8.80
  • Mistral Medium 3$8.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

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

Qwen3.5 Plus is the better all-round choice, scoring 66/100 against Mistral Medium 3 (53). It leads on capability, inputs & features and context window. Mistral Medium 3 wins on price. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

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

Mistral Medium 3 is cheaper at $0.40 input / $2.00 output per million tokens (official Mistral API price). Qwen3.5 Plus costs $0.40 input / $2.40 output per million tokens (official Alibaba API price). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.80 per million tokens for Mistral Medium 3 versus $0.90 for Qwen3.5 Plus (1.1× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Qwen3.5 Plus scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Qwen3.5 Plus 146.8 (#65 of 148) and Mistral Medium 3 134.1 (#117 of 148). Their confidence ranges do not overlap (144.6–148.1 vs 130.5–135.6), so the gap is a real one. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Qwen3.5 Plus 84.9%, Mistral Medium 3 59.5%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Qwen3.5 Plus 86.7%, Mistral Medium 3 32.2%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Qwen3.5 Plus and Mistral Medium 3 yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Qwen3.5 Plus 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 Plus has the largest context window at 1,000,000 tokens, against 131,072 for Mistral Medium 3. Maximum output per response: Qwen3.5 Plus up to 65,536, Mistral Medium 3 up to 131,072 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

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

Are any of these open source?

No. Qwen3.5 Plus and Mistral Medium 3 are proprietary and only available through APIs and apps.

Which is newer?

Qwen3.5 Plus is the newest, released Feb 16, 2026. Mistral Medium 3 came out May 7, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: Qwen3.5 Plus Apr 2025, 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.