GPT-4o vs Mistral Small
Comparing GPT-4o and Mistral Small across benchmarks, pricing, and capabilities.
OpenAI · Mistral AI · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
GPT-4o and Mistral Small trade strengths across price, capabilities, and technical limits. The better choice depends on the workload.
On price, Mistral Small is roughly 14.6x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.
GPT-4o also accepts a larger context window (128,000 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.
Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.
Choose GPT-4o
- you process long inputs — it offers a 128,000 token context window
Choose Mistral Small
- cost matters — it's about 14.6x cheaper per token
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Sep 2024
- you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Individual benchmarks
38 reported for GPT-4o · 0 for Mistral Small
GPT-4o and Mistral Smalldon't have any common benchmark datasets to compare. They may have been evaluated on different testing suites.
Human preference
Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores
Pricing Analysis
Price comparison per million tokens
For input processing, GPT-4o ($2.50/1M tokens) is 12.5x more expensive than Mistral Small ($0.20/1M tokens).
For output processing, GPT-4o ($10.00/1M tokens) is 16.7x more expensive than Mistral Small ($0.60/1M tokens).
In conclusion, GPT-4o is more expensive than Mistral Small.*
* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
GPT-4o accepts 128,000 input tokens compared to Mistral Small's 32,768 tokens. Mistral Small can generate longer responses up to 32,768 tokens, while GPT-4o is limited to 16,384 tokens.
Input capabilities
Documented input modalities across available providers
GPT-4o supports multimodal inputs, whereas Mistral Small does not.
GPT-4o can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
GPT-4o
Mistral Small
License
Usage and distribution terms
GPT-4o is licensed under a proprietary license, while Mistral Small uses Mistral Research License.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
Proprietary
Closed source
Mistral Research License
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
GPT-4o was released on 2024-08-06, while Mistral Small was released on 2024-09-17.
Mistral Small is 1 month newer than GPT-4o.
Aug 6, 2024
2.1 years ago
Sep 17, 2024
1.9 years ago
1mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.
Unable to compare the recency of their training data.
Provider Availability
GPT-4o is available from Azure, OpenAI. Mistral Small is available from Mistral AI.
GPT-4o
Mistral Small
Outputs Comparison
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against GPT-4o and Mistral Small side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about GPT-4o vs Mistral Small.