ZMIME
Comparison · 2 models · Updated Oct 4, 2026

Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 vs Mistral Medium 3

Mistral Medium 3 comes out ahead, 53 to 44 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.

  1. Anthropic

    Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2

    Released Oct 22, 2024

    44/100
    • ECI133.5
    • Price$3.00 / $15.00
    • Context200K
    Full specs Remove Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2
  2. Our pick

    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

Mistral Medium 3 is our pick

Mistral Medium 3 is the better all-round choice, scoring 53/100 against Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 (44). It leads on price. Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 wins on inputs & features and context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

  • CapabilityMistral Medium 3Capabilities Index (ECI): Mistral Medium 3 134.1 · Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 133.5
  • Lowest priceMistral Medium 3Mistral Medium 3 $0.80 · Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 $6.00 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
  • Longest contextClaude Sonnet 3.5 v2Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 200,000 · Mistral Medium 3 131,072 tokens
  • Widest inputsClaude Sonnet 3.5 v2Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2: Text, Images, PDFs · Mistral Medium 3: Text, Images
  • Self-hostingNo open weightsBoth are available only through APIs
How the score is built
MeasureWeightClaude Sonnet 3.5 v2Mistral Medium 3
CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI)50%5758
Price25%1354
Inputs & features15%6050
Context window10%3224
Overall100%44/10053/100
02 — Side by side

Every spec in one table

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

Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 vs Mistral Medium 3 specifications side by side
SpecificationClaude Sonnet 3.5 v2AnthropicMistral Medium 3Mistral AI
Capability
Capabilities Index (ECI)133.5134.1 (best)
ECI rank#119 of 148#117 of 148 (best)
GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions55.3%59.5% (best)
OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics8.5%32.2% (best)
Price per million tokens
Input$3.00$0.40 (best)
Output$15.00$2.00 (best)
Cached input——
Blended (3:1)$6.00$0.80 (best)
Long-context rateSame rateSame rate
Price sourceMedian of 1 providersOfficial Mistral API
Limits
Context window200,000 tokens (best)131,072 tokens
Max output8,192 tokens131,072 tokens (best)
Inputs and features
TextYesYes
ImagesYesYes
PDFsYesNo
AudioNoNo
VideoNoNo
ReasoningNoNo
Tool callingYesYes
Structured outputNoNo
Availability
WeightsProprietaryProprietary
API model ID—mistral-medium-2505
API providers15 (best)
ReleasedOct 22, 2024May 7, 2025
Knowledge cutoffApr 30, 2024May 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.

  • Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2$60.00
  • Mistral Medium 3$8.00
04 — Questions

Which should you choose?

Which is better: Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 or Mistral Medium 3?

Mistral Medium 3 is the better all-round choice, scoring 53/100 against Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 (44). It leads on price. Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 wins on inputs & features and context window. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 or Mistral Medium 3?

Mistral Medium 3 is cheaper at $0.40 input / $2.00 output per million tokens (official Mistral API price). Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 costs $3.00 input / $15.00 output per million tokens (median across 1 API provider). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.80 per million tokens for Mistral Medium 3 versus $6.00 for Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 (7.5× as much).

Which scores higher on benchmarks?

Mistral Medium 3 scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): Mistral Medium 3 134.1 (#117 of 148) and Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 133.5 (#119 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (130.5–135.6 vs 129.2–137.5), so treat the gap as small. On individual benchmarks: GPQA Diamond — Mistral Medium 3 59.5%, Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 55.3%; OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025 — Mistral Medium 3 32.2%, Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 8.5%.

Which is better for coding?

There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 and Mistral Medium 3 yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, Mistral Medium 3 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?

Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 has the largest context window at 200,000 tokens, against 131,072 for Mistral Medium 3. Maximum output per response: Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 up to 8,192, Mistral Medium 3 up to 131,072 tokens.

Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?

Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 accepts text, images and PDFs; Mistral Medium 3 accepts text and images. Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 handles the widest range of inputs.

Are any of these open source?

No. Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 and Mistral Medium 3 are proprietary and only available through APIs and apps.

Which is newer?

Mistral Medium 3 is the newest, released May 7, 2025. Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 came out Oct 22, 2024. Knowledge cutoff: Claude Sonnet 3.5 v2 Apr 30, 2024, 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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