Model Comparison

Magistral Small 2506 vs Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Magistral Small 2506 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

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Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

1 benchmarks

Magistral Small 2506 outperforms in 1 benchmarks (AIME 2025), while Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is better at 0 benchmarks.

Magistral Small 2506 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Thu May 14 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

15.0B diff

Magistral Small 2506 has 15.0B more parameters than Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct, making it 166.7% larger.

Magistral Small 2506

24.0Bparameters

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

9.0Bparameters

24.0B

Magistral Small 2506

9.0B

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct specifies input context (131,072 tokens). Only Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct specifies output context (32,768 tokens).

Magistral Small 2506

Input- tokens

Output- tokens

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Input131,072 tokens

Output32,768 tokens

Thu May 14 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct supports multimodal inputs, whereas Magistral Small 2506 does not.

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.

Magistral Small 2506

Text

Images

Audio

Video

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

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.

Magistral Small 2506

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Magistral Small 2506 was released on 2025-06-10, while Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct was released on 2025-09-22.

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is 3 months newer than Magistral Small 2506.

Magistral Small 2506

Jun 10, 2025

11 months ago

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

Sep 22, 2025

7 months ago

3mo newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Magistral Small 2506 has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2025-06-01, while Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct'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 Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct's cutoff date.

Magistral Small 2506

Jun 2025

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

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Outputs Comparison

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Key Takeaways

Magistral Small 2506

View details

Mistral AI

Higher AIME 2025 score (62.8% vs 45.9%)

Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

View details

Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team

Larger context window (131,072 tokens)

Supports multimodal inputs

Detailed Comparison

AI Model Comparison Table
Feature	Magistral Small 2506	Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct

FAQ

Common questions about Magistral Small 2506 vs Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct.

Which is better, Magistral Small 2506 or Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Magistral Small 2506 significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Magistral Small 2506 is made by Mistral AI and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Magistral Small 2506 compare to Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct in benchmarks?

Magistral Small 2506 scores AIME 2024: 70.7%, GPQA: 68.2%, AIME 2025: 62.8%, LiveCodeBench: 51.3%. Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct scores DocVQAtest: 96.1%, ScreenSpot: 94.4%, OCRBench: 89.6%, AI2D: 85.7%, MMBench-V1.1: 85.0%.

What are the context window sizes for Magistral Small 2506 and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Magistral Small 2506 supports an unknown number of tokens and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct supports 131K tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Magistral Small 2506 and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

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

Who makes Magistral Small 2506 and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct?

Magistral Small 2506 is developed by Mistral AI and Qwen3 VL 8B Instruct is developed by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team.