Mistral Medium 3.5 is Mistral's best model for coding — it scores 91/100 vs 88/100 for Codestral 25.01, at $1.5/1M input tokens. Across all providers, Claude Fable 5 still leads coding at 100/100 — worth considering if you're not committed to Mistral.
The shortest way to see the safest default, the lower-cost option, and the specialist pick before you read deeper.
Mistral Medium 3.5 is the safest overall answer here when you want the strongest default instead of the lowest list price.
Mistral: Mistral Nemo is the lower-cost option to start with when you still need useful output at scale.
Codestral 25.01 is the better pick when response speed matters more than maximum reasoning depth.
Codestral 25.01 leads Mistral's lineup for coding at 88/100 ($0.9/1M input, 256K context).
Codestral 25.01 is the value pick at $0.9/1M input with a coding score of 88/100.
Claude Fable 5 (Anthropic) is the overall coding leader at 100/100 if provider choice is open.
Choose Codestral 25.01 when coding quality is the priority and you're staying on Mistral.
Choose Codestral 25.01 when token volume matters more than peak quality.
Teams open to other providers should also evaluate Claude Fable 5 before committing.
Switch the scoring lens to see whether the top answer changes when you care more about cost, speed, or long-document work.
Mistral / Balanced / Aug 7, 2026
Best balanced generalist for EU teams with data residency needs.
Ranks models by the broadest mix of coding, writing, research, and long-context usefulness.
You want best-in-class performance for any specific use case — the frontier leaders win.
The fastest way to see where the recommendation shifts when your priority changes.
Best budget-focused coding specialist for high-volume developer teams.
Best balanced generalist for EU teams with data residency needs.
Ultra-cheap multimodal model for massive-volume, low-complexity pipelines.
77.6% SWE-bench Verified — the strongest dense open-weights coding score at release
Single-checkpoint multimodality with function calling and structured outputs
Open weights under a modified MIT license, practical to self-host and fine-tune at 128B dense
Trails GPT-5.6, Opus-class, and Gemini frontier models on complex multi-step reasoning; sparse published benchmark disclosure
256K context is a quarter of the 1M frontier norm, and $7.50/1M output is dear for the tier
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Mistral Medium 3.5 — it scores 91/100 on coding in this directory, ahead of Codestral 25.01 at 88/100. Best self-hostable multimodal model — European, dense, MIT-licensed.
Not overall. Claude Fable 5 (Anthropic) leads the directory for coding at 100/100 vs Mistral Medium 3.5's 91/100. Mistral Medium 3.5 is the best pick if you're staying within Mistral's ecosystem.
Codestral 25.01 at $0.9/1M input tokens (coding score: 88/100). Use it for volume work and reserve Mistral Medium 3.5 for the tasks where quality matters most.
$1.5/1M input tokens and $7.5/1M output tokens via the API, or through Le Chat Pro at $14.99/mo for chat use. Context window: 256K tokens.