Choose Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) if…
- you generate long outputs in one go — up to 105K tokens (about 78,600 words) per response
- you want the newer model — released 2025-08-13, 13 months after the other
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) vs OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini
Neither wins outright: Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) is the pick when you generate long outputs in one go, OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini when cost matters at scale.
Key numbers
| Spec | Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Mistral AI | OpenAI |
| Input price (per 1M tokens) | $0.20 | $0.15 |
| Output price (per 1M tokens) | $1.00 | $0.60 |
| Blended price (3:1 input/output) | $0.40 | $0.26 |
| Cheaper than … of all models we track | 58% | 64% |
| Context window | 131K tokens (~197 pages) | 128K tokens (~192 pages) |
| Larger context than … of all models | 23% | 15% |
| Max output per response | 105K tokens (~78,600 words) | 16K tokens (~12,300 words) |
| Input types | text, image, file | text, image, file |
| Output types | text | text |
| Free variant | No | No |
| Listed since | 2025-08-13 | 2024-07-18 |
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What it costs for real workloads
Monthly cost at list price for five common workloads. Token counts per unit are stated so you can scale them to your own traffic. A workload that does not fit a model's context window is marked rather than priced.
| Workload (per month) | Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Customer-support chatbot 50,000 conversations — each a 6-turn conversation (1,500 in / 400 out tokens) | $35.00 | $23.25 | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini saves $11.75 |
| RAG search over documents 20,000 questions — each a question answered from ~8 retrieved passages (6,000 in / 500 out tokens) | $34.00 | $24.00 | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini saves $10.00 |
| Coding / tool-using agent 2,000 tasks — each a multi-step task with tool calls and file context (60,000 in / 6,000 out tokens) | $36.00 | $25.20 | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini saves $10.80 |
| Batch summarisation 10,000 documents — each a 6,000-word report summarised to a page (8,000 in / 600 out tokens) | $22.00 | $15.60 | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini saves $6.40 |
| Long-document analysis 500 documents — each a 150-page contract or codebase read in one pass (100,000 in / 2,000 out tokens) | $11.00 | $8.10 | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini saves $2.90 |
Capabilities side by side
| Capability | Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) | OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini | What it lets you do |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tool / function calling | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | call your APIs and run agent loops |
| Structured output (JSON schema) | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | return JSON that validates against your schema |
| Reasoning / thinking mode | — | — | spend extra tokens thinking before answering hard problems |
| Image input | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | read screenshots, charts and scanned pages |
| Audio input | — | — | take speech or audio directly |
| File / PDF input | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | accept documents without your own parsing step |
| Image output | — | — | generate images, not just text |
| Built-in web search | — | ✓ Yes | answer from live web results |
| Seed (reproducible sampling) | ✓ Yes | ✓ Yes | repeat a generation for tests and evals |
| Log-probabilities | — | ✓ Yes | read token confidence for classification and scoring |
From each model's published parameters and input/output types. “—” means not advertised, not proven absent.
Price history
- Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch): input price cut 50% ($0.40 → $0.20/1M), output price cut 50% ($2.00 → $1.00/1M) on 2026-09-10.
- OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini: price unchanged since we started tracking it on 2026-03-10.
| Date | Model | Input / 1M | Output / 1M |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2026-09-10 | Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) | $0.20 | $1.00 |
Which should you choose?
Choose OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini if…
- cost matters at scale — it is 34% cheaper on a typical 3:1 input/output mix ($23.25 vs $35.00 a month for 50,000 support chats)
- you need built-in web search — to answer from live web results; Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) does not advertise it
- you need log-probabilities — to read token confidence for classification and scoring; Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) does not advertise it
Frequently asked questions
Is Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) better than OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini?
Neither wins outright: Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) is the pick when you generate long outputs in one go, OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini when cost matters at scale. In short: Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) when you generate long outputs in one go, you want the newer model; OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini when cost matters at scale, you need built-in web search, you need log-probabilities.
Which is cheaper, Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) or OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini?
OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini is cheaper: $0.26 vs $0.40 per 1M tokens at a typical 3:1 input/output mix, 34% less. For 50,000 support conversations a month that is $23.25 against $35.00.
How much do Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) and OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini cost per million tokens?
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) costs $0.20 per 1M input tokens and $1.00 per 1M output tokens; OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini costs $0.15 input and $0.60 output. Output tokens are billed separately, so long answers shift the gap.
Which has the bigger context window, Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) or OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini?
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch): 131K tokens, about 197 pages, against 128K (about 192 pages) for OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini.
Do Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) and OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini support function calling and JSON output?
Tool calling — Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch): yes, OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini: yes. JSON-schema structured output — Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch): yes, OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini: yes.
Can Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) or OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini read images?
Yes, both accept image input.
Is Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) or OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini free to use?
No free variant is listed for either; both are pay-per-token.
What is the maximum output length of Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) and OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini?
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) can write up to 105K tokens (about 78,600 words) per response; OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini up to 16K (about 12,300 words).
When were Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) and OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini released?
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) was listed on 2025-08-13; OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini on 2024-07-18.
Has the price of Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) or OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini changed?
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch): input price cut 50% ($0.40 → $0.20/1M), output price cut 50% ($2.00 → $1.00/1M) on 2026-09-10. OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini: price unchanged since we started tracking it on 2026-03-10.
About the two models
Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch)
Mistral Medium 3.1 is an updated version of Mistral Medium 3, which is a high-performance enterprise-grade language model designed to deliver frontier-level capabilities at significantly reduced operational cost. It balances...
Full Mistral: Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch) specs →OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini
GPT-4o mini is OpenAI's newest model after [GPT-4 Omni](/models/openai/gpt-4o), supporting both text and image inputs with text outputs. As their most advanced small model, it is many multiples more affordable...
Full OpenAI: GPT-4o-mini specs →