The AI arena is free today

Open Superagent

IBM Granite 4.2 30B vs Pixtral-12B

IBM Granite 4.2 30B leads the LLM Stats Score 24.0 to -1.4.

IBM · Mistral AI · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

IBM Granite 4.2 30B leads the overall LLM Stats Score 24.0 to -1.4, ranking #156 overall.

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

Choose IBM Granite 4.2 30B

  • overall performance matters — it scores 24.0 and ranks #156 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning — it leads those capability indexes
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Aug 2026

Choose Pixtral-12B

  • you want predictable pricing at $0.15/M input and $0.15/M output

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Core performance indexes
24.0
#156
-1.4
#319
21.8
#165
-3.4
#320
9.6
#159
-2.5
#236
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
Input price
— / M
$0.15 / M
Output price
— / M
$0.15 / M
Context window
128,000

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

1 shared
Index
IBM Granite 4.2 30B
Pixtral-12B
25.6#103
1.3#284
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

18 reported for IBM Granite 4.2 30B · 12 for Pixtral-12B

No common benchmarks found

IBM Granite 4.2 30B and Pixtral-12Bdon'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

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

17.6B diff

IBM Granite 4.2 30B has 17.6B more parameters than Pixtral-12B, making it 141.9% larger.

IBM
IBM Granite 4.2 30B
30.0Bparameters
Mistral AI
Pixtral-12B
12.4Bparameters
30.0B
IBM Granite 4.2 30B
12.4B
Pixtral-12B

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Pixtral-12B specifies input context (128,000 tokens). Only Pixtral-12B specifies output context (8,192 tokens).

IBM
IBM Granite 4.2 30B
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Mistral AI
Pixtral-12B
Input128,000 tokens
Output8,192 tokens
Mon Aug 31 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Pixtral-12B supports multimodal inputs, whereas IBM Granite 4.2 30B does not.

Pixtral-12B can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

IBM Granite 4.2 30B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Pixtral-12B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Both models are licensed under Apache 2.0.

Both models share the same licensing terms, providing consistent usage rights.

IBM Granite 4.2 30B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Pixtral-12B

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

IBM Granite 4.2 30B was released on 2026-08-25, while Pixtral-12B was released on 2024-09-17.

IBM Granite 4.2 30B is 24 months newer than Pixtral-12B.

IBM Granite 4.2 30B

Aug 25, 2026

5 days ago

1.9yr newer
Pixtral-12B

Sep 17, 2024

2.0 years ago

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

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against IBM Granite 4.2 30B and Pixtral-12B side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

IBM Granite 4.2 30B
✓ Preferred
Pixtral-12B
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about IBM Granite 4.2 30B vs Pixtral-12B.

Which is better, IBM Granite 4.2 30B or Pixtral-12B?

IBM Granite 4.2 30B leads the LLM Stats Score 24.0 to -1.4. IBM Granite 4.2 30B is made by IBM and Pixtral-12B is made by Mistral AI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does IBM Granite 4.2 30B compare to Pixtral-12B in benchmarks?

IBM Granite 4.2 30B scores RULER 64k: 90.0%, AIME 2025: 89.2%, HMMT25: 89.2%, RULER 128k: 81.4%, MMLU-Pro: 77.6%. Pixtral-12B scores DocVQA: 90.7%, ChartQA: 81.8%, VQAv2: 78.6%, MT-Bench: 76.8%, HumanEval: 72.0%.

What are the context window sizes for IBM Granite 4.2 30B and Pixtral-12B?

IBM Granite 4.2 30B supports an unknown number of tokens and Pixtral-12B 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 IBM Granite 4.2 30B and Pixtral-12B?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (24.0 vs -1.4), multimodal support (no vs yes). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes IBM Granite 4.2 30B and Pixtral-12B?

IBM Granite 4.2 30B is developed by IBM and Pixtral-12B is developed by Mistral AI.