ZMIME
Comparison · 3 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

QwQ 32B vs Mistral Medium 3 vs GPT-4.1 mini

GPT-4.1 mini comes out ahead, 60 to 53 and 53 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.

  1. Alibaba (Qwen)

    QwQ 32B

    Released Mar 5, 2025

    53/100
    • ECI137.6
    • Price$0.66 / $1.00
    • Context131K
    Full specs Remove QwQ 32B

  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. Our pick

    OpenAI

    GPT-4.1 mini

    Released Apr 14, 2025

    60/100
    • ECI135.0
    • Price$0.40 / $1.60
    • Context1.05M
    Full specs Remove GPT-4.1 mini
01 — Verdict

GPT-4.1 mini is our pick

GPT-4.1 mini is the better all-round choice, scoring 60/100 against QwQ 32B (53) and Mistral Medium 3 (53). It leads on inputs & features and context window. QwQ 32B wins on capability. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityQwQ 32BCapabilities Index (ECI): QwQ 32B 137.6 · GPT-4.1 mini 135.0 · Mistral Medium 3 134.1
  • Lowest priceGPT-4.1 miniGPT-4.1 mini $0.70 · QwQ 32B $0.745 · Mistral Medium 3 $0.80 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextGPT-4.1 miniGPT-4.1 mini 1,047,576 · QwQ 32B 131,072 · Mistral Medium 3 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsGPT-4.1 miniQwQ 32B: Text · Mistral Medium 3: Text, Images · GPT-4.1 mini: Text, Images, PDFs
  • Self-hostingQwQ 32BPublishes downloadable weights
How the score is built
MeasureWeightQwQ 32BMistral Medium 3GPT-4.1 mini
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%625859
Price25%565457
Inputs & features15%355070
Context window10%242461
Overall100%53/10053/10060/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

QwQ 32B vs Mistral Medium 3 vs GPT-4.1 mini specifications side by side
SpecificationQwQ 32BAlibaba (Qwen)Mistral Medium 3Mistral AIGPT-4.1 miniOpenAI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)137.6 (best)134.1135.0
ECI rank#109 of 148 (best)#117 of 148#115 of 148
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions65.3%59.5%65.9% (best)
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics——6.7%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics59.2% (best)32.2%44.7%
SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions——12.7%
Price per million tokens
Input$0.66$0.40 (best)$0.40 (best)
Output$1.00 (best)$2.00$1.60
Cached input——$0.10
Blended (3:1)$0.745$0.80$0.70 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceMedian of 1 providersOfficial Mistral APIOfficial OpenAI API
Limits
Context window131,072 tokens131,072 tokens1,047,576 tokens (best)
Max output8,192 tokens131,072 tokens (best)32,768 tokens
Inputs and features
TextYesYesYes
ImagesNoYesYes
PDFsNoNoYes
AudioNoNoNo
VideoNoNoNo
ReasoningYesNoNo
Tool callingYesYesYes
Structured outputNoNoYes
Availability
WeightsOpenProprietaryProprietary
API model ID—mistral-medium-2505gpt-4.1-mini
API providers1524 (best)
ReleasedMar 5, 2025May 7, 2025Apr 14, 2025
Knowledge cutoffApr 2024May 2025Apr 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.

  • QwQ 32B$8.60
  • Mistral Medium 3$8.00
  • GPT-4.1 mini$7.20
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: QwQ 32B, Mistral Medium 3 or GPT-4.1 mini?

GPT-4.1 mini is the better all-round choice, scoring 60/100 against QwQ 32B (53) and Mistral Medium 3 (53). It leads on inputs & features and context window. QwQ 32B wins on capability. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, QwQ 32B, Mistral Medium 3 or GPT-4.1 mini?

GPT-4.1 mini is cheaper at $0.40 input / $1.60 output per million tokens (official OpenAI API price). QwQ 32B costs $0.66 input / $1.00 output per million tokens (median across 1 API provider); 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 $0.70 per million tokens for GPT-4.1 mini versus $0.745 for QwQ 32B (1.1× as much) and $0.80 for Mistral Medium 3 (1.1× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

QwQ 32B scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): QwQ 32B 137.6 (#109 of 148), GPT-4.1 mini 135.0 (#115 of 148) and Mistral Medium 3 134.1 (#117 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (133.1–141.7 vs 131.2–136.6), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — GPT-4.1 mini 65.9%, QwQ 32B 65.3%, Mistral Medium 3 59.5%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — QwQ 32B 59.2%, GPT-4.1 mini 44.7%, Mistral Medium 3 32.2%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for QwQ 32B, Mistral Medium 3 and GPT-4.1 mini yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, QwQ 32B leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.

Which has the bigger context window?

GPT-4.1 mini has the largest context window at 1,047,576 tokens, against 131,072 for QwQ 32B and 131,072 for Mistral Medium 3. Maximum output per response: QwQ 32B up to 8,192, Mistral Medium 3 up to 131,072, GPT-4.1 mini up to 32,768 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

QwQ 32B accepts text; Mistral Medium 3 accepts text and images; GPT-4.1 mini accepts text, images and PDFs. GPT-4.1 mini handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

QwQ 32B publishes its weights and can be self-hosted; Mistral Medium 3 and GPT-4.1 mini is proprietary.

Which is newer?

Mistral Medium 3 is the newest, released May 7, 2025. GPT-4.1 mini came out Apr 14, 2025; QwQ 32B came out Mar 5, 2025. Knowledge cutoff: QwQ 32B Apr 2024, Mistral Medium 3 May 2025, GPT-4.1 mini Apr 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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