Model Comparison

Claude 3 Sonnet vs Mistral Small 3 24B BaseWhich is better in 2026?

Claude 3 Sonnet shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.

Verdict: Claude 3 Sonnet vs Mistral Small 3 24B Base — which is better?

Claude 3 Sonnet (by Anthropic) and Mistral Small 3 24B Base (by Mistral AI) are two of the AI models people compare most. Here is how they stack up on benchmarks, price and capabilities, and which one to pick in 2026.

Claude 3 Sonnet outperforms in 4 benchmarks (ARC-C, GPQA, GSM8k, MMLU-Pro), while Mistral Small 3 24B Base is better at 2 benchmarks (MATH, MMLU). Claude 3 Sonnet shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.

Choose Claude 3 Sonnet if…

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 4 of 6 shared benchmarks

Choose Mistral Small 3 24B Base if…

  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Jan 2025
  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune
Want to compare interactively?Try the playground

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

6 benchmarks

Claude 3 Sonnet outperforms in 4 benchmarks (ARC-C, GPQA, GSM8k, MMLU-Pro), while Mistral Small 3 24B Base is better at 2 benchmarks (MATH, MMLU).

Claude 3 Sonnet shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks.

Fri Jun 12 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Claude 3 Sonnet specifies input context (200,000 tokens). Only Claude 3 Sonnet specifies output context (200,000 tokens).

Anthropic
Claude 3 Sonnet
Input200,000 tokens
Output200,000 tokens
Mistral AI
Mistral Small 3 24B Base
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Fri Jun 12 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Both Claude 3 Sonnet and Mistral Small 3 24B Base support multimodal inputs.

They are both capable of processing various types of data, offering versatility in application.

Claude 3 Sonnet

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Mistral Small 3 24B Base

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Claude 3 Sonnet is licensed under a proprietary license, while Mistral Small 3 24B Base uses Apache 2.0.

License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.

Claude 3 Sonnet

Proprietary

Closed source

Mistral Small 3 24B Base

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Claude 3 Sonnet was released on 2024-02-29, while Mistral Small 3 24B Base was released on 2025-01-30.

Mistral Small 3 24B Base is 11 months newer than Claude 3 Sonnet.

Claude 3 Sonnet

Feb 29, 2024

2.3 years ago

Mistral Small 3 24B Base

Jan 30, 2025

1.4 years ago

11mo newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Mistral Small 3 24B Base has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-10-01, while Claude 3 Sonnet's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Mistral Small 3 24B Base's training data extends to 2023-10-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Claude 3 Sonnet's cutoff date.

Claude 3 Sonnet

—

Mistral Small 3 24B Base

Oct 2023

Outputs Comparison

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Key Takeaways

Anthropic
Larger context window (200,000 tokens)
Higher ARC-C score (93.2% vs 91.3%)
Higher GPQA score (40.4% vs 34.4%)
Higher GSM8k score (92.3% vs 80.7%)
Higher MMLU-Pro score (56.8% vs 54.4%)
Mistral AI
Has open weights
Higher MATH score (46.0% vs 43.1%)
Higher MMLU score (80.7% vs 79.0%)

Detailed Comparison

AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
Anthropic
Claude 3 Sonnet
Mistral AI
Mistral Small 3 24B Base

FAQ

Common questions about Claude 3 Sonnet vs Mistral Small 3 24B Base.

Which is better, Claude 3 Sonnet or Mistral Small 3 24B Base?

Claude 3 Sonnet shows notably better performance in the majority of benchmarks. Claude 3 Sonnet is made by Anthropic and Mistral Small 3 24B Base is made by Mistral AI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Claude 3 Sonnet compare to Mistral Small 3 24B Base in benchmarks?

Claude 3 Sonnet scores ARC-C: 93.2%, GSM8k: 92.3%, HellaSwag: 89.0%, MGSM: 83.5%, BIG-Bench Hard: 82.9%. Mistral Small 3 24B Base scores ARC-C: 91.3%, GSM8k: 80.7%, MMLU: 80.7%, TriviaQA: 80.3%, MBPP: 69.6%.

What are the context window sizes for Claude 3 Sonnet and Mistral Small 3 24B Base?

Claude 3 Sonnet supports 200K tokens and Mistral Small 3 24B Base supports an unknown number of tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Claude 3 Sonnet and Mistral Small 3 24B Base?

Key differences include licensing (Proprietary vs Apache 2.0). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Claude 3 Sonnet and Mistral Small 3 24B Base?

Claude 3 Sonnet is developed by Anthropic and Mistral Small 3 24B Base is developed by Mistral AI.

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