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Head-to-head comparison

Mistral Small 4 vs Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct

Mistral Small 4 (Mistral AI) and Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct (Qwen) compared on the ModelCap Index, API price, context window, provider availability, weight access and every public benchmark board they share. Figures are the same ones shown on the live rankings; nothing here is a hidden score.

Snapshot as of 19 September 2026

As of 19 September 2026, Mistral Small 4 holds the stronger ModelCap Index position (#91 vs #92); and Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct is 2.1× cheaper per output token ($0.28/1M vs $0.60/1M).

Which should you choose?

Choose Mistral Small 4 if…

  • you want the stronger overall ModelCap Index position — #91 against #92 (50.4 vs 50.1 points).
  • you want the more recently listed model — Mistral Small 4 was listed 16 March 2026, Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct 31 July 2025.

Choose Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct if…

  • API cost matters — $0.28/1M output tokens against $0.60/1M, about 2.1× cheaper.
  • your workload is prompt-heavy — input tokens cost $0.07/1M against $0.15/1M.
  • you want provider choice — 4 listed API providers against 1.

Mistral Small 4 vs Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct: specs, pricing and context

Specification comparison of Mistral Small 4 and Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct
FieldMistral Small 4Mistral AIQwen3 Coder 30B A3B InstructQwen
ModelCap Index position#91#92
Index score50.450.1
EvidenceMeasuredEstimated
Input price / 1M tokens$0.15$0.07
Output price / 1M tokens$0.60$0.28
Context window262K tokens262K tokens
Max output tokens210K236K
API providers listed14
Weight accessOpen weightsOpen weights
Input modalitiesText, ImageText
First listed16 March 202631 July 2025
PublisherMistral AIQwen

Evidence: 1 public benchmark observation across 1 board · publisher-corpus-prior over 195 held-out anchors (7%); launch card against 3 resolved peers on 4 rows (93%); no cross-lab optimism probe available; shrunk 0.1 up toward the measured corpus. Prices are the lowest listed API offer per million tokens observed on the OpenRouter catalogue.

Benchmark scores: Mistral Small 4 vs Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct

Public benchmark boards where Mistral Small 4 or Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct has a published result
BoardMistral Small 4Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B InstructLeads
AA Intelligence IndexArtificial Analysis11.3intelligence-index:v4.3:reasoning-unspecified—Only one result
AA τ²-Bench TelecomArtificial Analysis—34.5%tau2:telecom:dual-control:pass-at-1:3-repeats:source-model="Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct":reasoning=falseOnly one result
AA Humanity's Last ExamArtificial Analysis—3.8%hle:may-2025:text-only-2158:no-tools:pass-at-1:source-model="Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct":reasoning=falseOnly one result

Scores are the sources' own published figures for each model's best evaluated configuration; ModelCap never re-runs a benchmark.

Want a different pairing? Open the interactive comparison tool to swap either model for any current ranked language model.

Mistral Small 4 vs Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct: common questions

Is Mistral Small 4 better than Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct?

Mistral Small 4 ranks higher on the ModelCap Index as of 19 September 2026: #91 against #92. That is a capability ranking built from public benchmark evidence with published uncertainty; whether it is "better" for you also depends on price, context and where you can run it. Their published uncertainty intervals overlap, so the rank difference alone does not establish a reliable capability advantage for your workload.

Is Mistral Small 4 cheaper than Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct?

Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct is cheaper on output tokens: $0.28/1M against $0.60/1M. Input tokens are $0.15/1M for Mistral Small 4 and $0.07/1M for Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct. Prices are the lowest listed API offer ModelCap observed, in USD per million tokens. For 1,000 requests with 2,000 input and 500 output tokens each (2M input + 0.5M output), the listed-rate estimate is $0.60 for Mistral Small 4 versus $0.28 for Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct. Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct costs 53.3% less in this scenario. This excludes caching, batch discounts, prompt-length tiers, tool charges and retries; verify the selected endpoint before budgeting.

Which has the bigger context window, Mistral Small 4 or Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct?

Both publish a 262K-token context window.

Which is better for coding, Mistral Small 4 or Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct?

The two models do not share a coding benchmark board on ModelCap yet, so no head-to-head coding score is published; the ModelCap Index position is the closest overall signal.

Are Mistral Small 4 and Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct open-weight models?

Mistral Small 4: Open weights. Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct: Open weights. Open weights mean the checkpoint can be downloaded and self-hosted under its licence; API-only models are available solely through hosted endpoints.

Where can I run Mistral Small 4 and Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct?

ModelCap currently lists 1 API provider for Mistral Small 4 and 4 for Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct, from the OpenRouter catalogue snapshot the site serves; each model page lists the providers and their prices.

How current is this Mistral Small 4 vs Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct comparison?

Every figure comes from the sealed ModelCap dataset published 19 September 2026; the page re-renders within a minute of each data refresh, and the ModelCap Index positions are the same ones shown on the live rankings.

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