Model Comparison

Ministral 8B Instruct vs Phi 4 MiniWhich is better in 2026?

Phi 4 Mini has a slight edge in benchmark performance.

Verdict: Ministral 8B Instruct vs Phi 4 Mini — which is better?

Ministral 8B Instruct (by Mistral AI) and Phi 4 Mini (by Microsoft) 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.

Ministral 8B Instruct outperforms in 2 benchmarks (Arena Hard, Winogrande), while Phi 4 Mini is better at 3 benchmarks (ARC-C, MATH, MMLU). Phi 4 Mini has a slight edge in benchmark performance.

Choose Ministral 8B Instruct if…

  • you want predictable pricing at $0.10/M input and $0.10/M output

Choose Phi 4 Mini if…

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 3 of 5 shared benchmarks
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Feb 2025

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

5 benchmarks

Ministral 8B Instruct outperforms in 2 benchmarks (Arena Hard, Winogrande), while Phi 4 Mini is better at 3 benchmarks (ARC-C, MATH, MMLU).

Phi 4 Mini has a slight edge in benchmark performance.

Sat Aug 01 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Human preference votes

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

4.2B diff

Ministral 8B Instruct has 4.2B more parameters than Phi 4 Mini, making it 108.8% larger.

Mistral AI
Ministral 8B Instruct
8.0Bparameters
Microsoft
Phi 4 Mini
3.8Bparameters
8.0B
Ministral 8B Instruct
3.8B
Phi 4 Mini

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
Ministral 8B Instruct
Input128,000 tokens
Output128,000 tokens
Microsoft
Phi 4 Mini
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Sat Aug 01 2026 • llm-stats.com

License

Usage and distribution terms

Ministral 8B Instruct is licensed under Mistral Research License, while Phi 4 Mini uses MIT.

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

Ministral 8B Instruct

Mistral Research License

Open weights

Phi 4 Mini

MIT

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Ministral 8B Instruct was released on 2024-10-16, while Phi 4 Mini was released on 2025-02-01.

Phi 4 Mini is 4 months newer than Ministral 8B Instruct.

Ministral 8B Instruct

Oct 16, 2024

1.8 years ago

Phi 4 Mini

Feb 1, 2025

1.5 years ago

3mo newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Phi 4 Mini has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2024-06-01, while Ministral 8B Instruct's cutoff date is not specified.

We can confirm Phi 4 Mini's training data extends to 2024-06-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Ministral 8B Instruct's cutoff date.

Ministral 8B Instruct

—

Phi 4 Mini

Jun 2024

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Key Takeaways

Mistral AI
Larger context window (128,000 tokens)
Higher Arena Hard score (70.9% vs 32.8%)
Higher Winogrande score (75.3% vs 67.0%)
Microsoft
Higher ARC-C score (83.7% vs 71.9%)
Higher MATH score (64.0% vs 54.5%)
Higher MMLU score (67.3% vs 65.0%)

Detailed Comparison

Interactive Arena

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Ministral 8B Instruct and Phi 4 Mini side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Ministral 8B Instruct
✓ Preferred
Phi 4 Mini
Open in Playground
AI Model Comparison Table
Feature
Mistral AI
Ministral 8B Instruct
Microsoft
Phi 4 Mini

FAQ

Common questions about Ministral 8B Instruct vs Phi 4 Mini.

Which is better, Ministral 8B Instruct or Phi 4 Mini?

Phi 4 Mini has a slight edge in benchmark performance. Ministral 8B Instruct is made by Mistral AI and Phi 4 Mini is made by Microsoft. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Ministral 8B Instruct compare to Phi 4 Mini in benchmarks?

Ministral 8B Instruct scores MT-Bench: 83.0%, Winogrande: 75.3%, ARC-C: 71.9%, Arena Hard: 70.9%, MBPP pass@1: 70.0%. Phi 4 Mini scores GSM8k: 88.6%, ARC-C: 83.7%, BoolQ: 81.2%, OpenBookQA: 79.2%, PIQA: 77.6%.

What are the context window sizes for Ministral 8B Instruct and Phi 4 Mini?

Ministral 8B Instruct supports 128K tokens and Phi 4 Mini supports an unknown number of tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Ministral 8B Instruct and Phi 4 Mini?

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

Who makes Ministral 8B Instruct and Phi 4 Mini?

Ministral 8B Instruct is developed by Mistral AI and Phi 4 Mini is developed by Microsoft.

Related comparisons