Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct vs Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking leads the LLM Stats Score 16.2 to 4.2. Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct is 11.4x cheaper per token.
Mistral AI · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026
Which is better?
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking leads the overall LLM Stats Score 16.2 to 4.2, ranking #240 overall.
In the 3 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking wins 3; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.
On price, Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct is roughly 11.4x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking also accepts a larger context window (262,144 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 Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct
- cost matters — it's about 11.4x cheaper per token
Choose Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking
- overall performance matters — it scores 16.2 and ranks #240 on LLM Stats
- your work emphasizes reasoning — it leads those capability indexes
- you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 3 of 3 exact shared results
- you process long inputs — it offers a 262,144 token context window
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Sep 2025
At a glance
The differences that matter most.
Capability indexes
Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks
Individual benchmarks
8 reported for Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct · 50 for Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct outperforms in 0 benchmarks, while Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking is better at 3 benchmarks (GPQA, IFEval, MMLU-Pro).
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Human preference
Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores
Pricing Analysis
Price comparison per million tokens
For input processing, Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct ($0.05/1M tokens) is 3.6x cheaper than Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking ($0.18/1M tokens).
For output processing, Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct ($0.08/1M tokens) is 26.1x cheaper than Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking ($2.09/1M tokens).
In conclusion, Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking is more expensive than Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct.*
* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens
Model Size
Parameter count comparison
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct has 15.0B more parameters than Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking, making it 166.7% larger.
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking accepts 262,144 input tokens compared to Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct's 32,768 tokens. Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking can generate longer responses up to 262,144 tokens, while Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct is limited to 32,768 tokens.
Input capabilities
Documented input modalities across available providers
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking supports multimodal inputs, whereas Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct does not.
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking
License
Usage and distribution terms
Both models are licensed under Apache 2.0.
Both models share the same licensing terms, providing consistent usage rights.
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Apache 2.0
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct was released on 2025-01-30, while Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking was released on 2025-09-22.
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking is 8 months newer than Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct.
Jan 30, 2025
1.7 years ago
Sep 22, 2025
1.0 years ago
7mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2023-10-01, while Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct's training data extends to 2023-10-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking's cutoff date.
Oct 2023
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Provider Availability
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct is available from DeepInfra, Mistral AI. Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking is available from DeepInfra.
Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct
Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking
Outputs Comparison
Judge for yourself.
Run your own prompts against Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct and Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.
FAQ
Common questions about Mistral Small 3 24B Instruct vs Qwen3 VL 8B Thinking.