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DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B vs Grok-3 Mini

Grok-3 Mini leads the LLM Stats Score 31.7 to 8.6.

DeepSeek · xAI · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Grok-3 Mini leads the overall LLM Stats Score 31.7 to 8.6, ranking #98 overall.

In the 3 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Grok-3 Mini wins 3; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B

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

Choose Grok-3 Mini

  • overall performance matters — it scores 31.7 and ranks #98 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning and coding — it leads those capability indexes
  • you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 3 of 3 exact shared results
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Feb 2025

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B
DeepSeek
Grok-3 Mini
xAI
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
8.6
#261
31.7
#98
Reasoning
8.9
#251
31.3
#98
Coding
2.2
#214
18.9
#98
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
0 of 3
3 of 3
Input price
— / M
$0.30 / M
Output price
— / M
$0.50 / M
Context window
—
128,000

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

1 shared
Index
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B
Grok-3 Mini
Math
14.1#211
28.5#85
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

4 reported for DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B · 4 for Grok-3 Mini

3 shared

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Grok-3 Mini is better at 3 benchmarks (AIME 2024, GPQA, LiveCodeBench).

Grok-3 Mini significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Mon Aug 31 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Grok-3 Mini specifies input context (128,000 tokens). Only Grok-3 Mini specifies output context (8,000 tokens).

DeepSeek
DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
xAI
Grok-3 Mini
Input128,000 tokens
Output8,000 tokens
Mon Aug 31 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Grok-3 Mini supports multimodal inputs, whereas DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B does not.

Grok-3 Mini can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Grok-3 Mini

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B is licensed under MIT, while Grok-3 Mini uses a proprietary license.

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

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B

MIT

Open weights

Grok-3 Mini

Proprietary

Closed source

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B was released on 2025-01-20, while Grok-3 Mini was released on 2025-02-17.

Grok-3 Mini is 1 month newer than DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B.

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B

Jan 20, 2025

1.6 years ago

Grok-3 Mini

Feb 17, 2025

1.5 years ago

4w newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Grok-3 Mini has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2024-11-17, while DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Grok-3 Mini's training data extends to 2024-11-17, but cannot make a direct comparison without DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B's cutoff date.

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B

—

Grok-3 Mini

Nov 2024

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B and Grok-3 Mini side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B
✓ Preferred
Grok-3 Mini
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B vs Grok-3 Mini.

Which is better, DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B or Grok-3 Mini?

Grok-3 Mini leads the LLM Stats Score 31.7 to 8.6. DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B is made by DeepSeek and Grok-3 Mini is made by xAI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B compare to Grok-3 Mini in benchmarks?

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B scores MATH-500: 92.8%, AIME 2024: 83.3%, GPQA: 49.1%, LiveCodeBench: 37.6%. Grok-3 Mini scores AIME 2024: 95.8%, AIME 2025: 90.8%, GPQA: 84.0%, LiveCodeBench: 80.4%.

What are the context window sizes for DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B and Grok-3 Mini?

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B supports an unknown number of tokens and Grok-3 Mini 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 DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B and Grok-3 Mini?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (8.6 vs 31.7), multimodal support (no vs yes), licensing (MIT vs Proprietary). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B and Grok-3 Mini?

DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B is developed by DeepSeek and Grok-3 Mini is developed by xAI.

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