Model Comparison

Claude Opus 4.6 vs Magistral Small 2506Which is better in 2026?

Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Verdict: Claude Opus 4.6 vs Magistral Small 2506 — which is better?

Claude Opus 4.6 (by Anthropic) and Magistral Small 2506 (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 Opus 4.6 outperforms in 2 benchmarks (AIME 2025, GPQA), while Magistral Small 2506 is better at 0 benchmarks. Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Choose Claude Opus 4.6 if…

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 2 of 2 shared benchmarks
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Feb 2026

Choose Magistral Small 2506 if…

  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune
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Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

2 benchmarks

Claude Opus 4.6 outperforms in 2 benchmarks (AIME 2025, GPQA), while Magistral Small 2506 is better at 0 benchmarks.

Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Fri Jun 12 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Claude Opus 4.6 specifies input context (1,000,000 tokens). Only Claude Opus 4.6 specifies output context (128,000 tokens).

Anthropic
Claude Opus 4.6
Input1,000,000 tokens
Output128,000 tokens
Mistral AI
Magistral Small 2506
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Fri Jun 12 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Claude Opus 4.6 supports multimodal inputs, whereas Magistral Small 2506 does not.

Claude Opus 4.6 can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Claude Opus 4.6

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Magistral Small 2506

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Claude Opus 4.6 is licensed under a proprietary license, while Magistral Small 2506 uses Apache 2.0.

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

Claude Opus 4.6

Proprietary

Closed source

Magistral Small 2506

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Claude Opus 4.6 was released on 2026-02-05, while Magistral Small 2506 was released on 2025-06-10.

Claude Opus 4.6 is 8 months newer than Magistral Small 2506.

Claude Opus 4.6

Feb 5, 2026

4 months ago

8mo newer
Magistral Small 2506

Jun 10, 2025

1.0 years ago

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Magistral Small 2506 has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2025-06-01, while Claude Opus 4.6's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Magistral Small 2506's training data extends to 2025-06-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Claude Opus 4.6's cutoff date.

Claude Opus 4.6

—

Magistral Small 2506

Jun 2025

Outputs Comparison

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Key Takeaways

Anthropic
Larger context window (1,000,000 tokens)
Supports multimodal inputs
Higher AIME 2025 score (99.8% vs 62.8%)
Higher GPQA score (91.3% vs 68.2%)
Mistral AI
Has open weights

Detailed Comparison

AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
Anthropic
Claude Opus 4.6
Mistral AI
Magistral Small 2506

FAQ

Common questions about Claude Opus 4.6 vs Magistral Small 2506.

Which is better, Claude Opus 4.6 or Magistral Small 2506?

Claude Opus 4.6 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Claude Opus 4.6 is made by Anthropic and Magistral Small 2506 is made by Mistral AI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Claude Opus 4.6 compare to Magistral Small 2506 in benchmarks?

Claude Opus 4.6 scores Vending-Bench 2: 100.0%, AIME 2025: 99.8%, Tau2 Telecom: 99.3%, Graphwalks parents >128k: 95.4%, Tau2 Retail: 91.9%. Magistral Small 2506 scores AIME 2024: 70.7%, GPQA: 68.2%, AIME 2025: 62.8%, LiveCodeBench: 51.3%.

What are the context window sizes for Claude Opus 4.6 and Magistral Small 2506?

Claude Opus 4.6 supports 1.0M tokens and Magistral Small 2506 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 Opus 4.6 and Magistral Small 2506?

Key differences include multimodal support (yes vs no), licensing (Proprietary vs Apache 2.0). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Claude Opus 4.6 and Magistral Small 2506?

Claude Opus 4.6 is developed by Anthropic and Magistral Small 2506 is developed by Mistral AI.

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