Model Comparison

Codestral-22B vs Ministral 8B InstructWhich is better in 2026?

Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Verdict: Codestral-22B vs Ministral 8B Instruct — which is better?

Codestral-22B (by Mistral AI) and Ministral 8B Instruct (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.

Codestral-22B outperforms in 1 benchmarks (HumanEval), while Ministral 8B Instruct is better at 0 benchmarks. Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Choose Codestral-22B if…

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 1 of 1 shared benchmarks

Choose Ministral 8B Instruct if…

  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Oct 2024

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

1 benchmarks

Codestral-22B outperforms in 1 benchmarks (HumanEval), while Ministral 8B Instruct is better at 0 benchmarks.

Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Tue Jul 28 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

14.2B diff

Codestral-22B has 14.2B more parameters than Ministral 8B Instruct, making it 176.8% larger.

Mistral AI
Codestral-22B
22.2Bparameters
Mistral AI
Ministral 8B Instruct
8.0Bparameters
22.2B
Codestral-22B
8.0B
Ministral 8B Instruct

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Ministral 8B Instruct specifies input context (128,000 tokens). Only Ministral 8B Instruct specifies output context (128,000 tokens).

Mistral AI
Codestral-22B
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Mistral AI
Ministral 8B Instruct
Input128,000 tokens
Output128,000 tokens
Tue Jul 28 2026 • llm-stats.com

License

Usage and distribution terms

Codestral-22B is licensed under MNPL-0.1, while Ministral 8B Instruct uses Mistral Research License.

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

Codestral-22B

MNPL-0.1

Open weights

Ministral 8B Instruct

Mistral Research License

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Codestral-22B was released on 2024-05-29, while Ministral 8B Instruct was released on 2024-10-16.

Ministral 8B Instruct is 5 months newer than Codestral-22B.

Codestral-22B

May 29, 2024

2.2 years ago

Ministral 8B Instruct

Oct 16, 2024

1.8 years ago

4mo newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Key Takeaways

Mistral AI
Higher HumanEval score (81.1% vs 34.8%)
Mistral AI
Larger context window (128,000 tokens)

Detailed Comparison

Interactive Arena

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Codestral-22B and Ministral 8B Instruct side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Codestral-22B
✓ Preferred
Ministral 8B Instruct
Open in Playground
AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
Mistral AI
Codestral-22B
Mistral AI
Ministral 8B Instruct

FAQ

Common questions about Codestral-22B vs Ministral 8B Instruct.

Which is better, Codestral-22B or Ministral 8B Instruct?

Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Codestral-22B is made by Mistral AI and Ministral 8B Instruct is made by Mistral AI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Codestral-22B compare to Ministral 8B Instruct in benchmarks?

Codestral-22B scores HumanEvalFIM-Average: 91.6%, HumanEval: 81.1%, MBPP: 78.2%, Spider: 63.5%, HumanEval-Average: 61.5%. Ministral 8B Instruct scores MT-Bench: 83.0%, Winogrande: 75.3%, ARC-C: 71.9%, Arena Hard: 70.9%, MBPP pass@1: 70.0%.

What are the context window sizes for Codestral-22B and Ministral 8B Instruct?

Codestral-22B supports an unknown number of tokens and Ministral 8B Instruct supports 128K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Codestral-22B and Ministral 8B Instruct?

Key differences include licensing (MNPL-0.1 vs Mistral Research License). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

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