Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4

    Comparison

    As of August 25, 2026, Mistral Small 4 is 96% cheaper per million tokens than Grok-4.1 Thinking. Grok-4.1 Thinking is $3.00 / $15.00 per million input/output tokens versus Mistral Small 4 at $0.15 / $0.60. Sources: https://docs.x.ai/docs/models and https://docs.mistral.ai/platform/pricing/

    Sources: xAI API pricing (https://docs.x.ai/docs/models); Mistral AI pricing (https://docs.mistral.ai/platform/pricing/)

    Grok-4.1 Thinking

    xAI

    $18.00blended / 1M

    Input

    $3.00

    Output

    $15.00

    256K ctx|Proprietary
    96%
    cheaper
    Better value

    Mistral Small 4

    Mistral

    $0.75blended / 1M

    Input

    $0.15

    Output

    $0.60

    256K ctx|Open Source
    Save $17.25 per million tokens by choosing Mistral Small 4 over Grok-4.1 Thinking.

    Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4 comparison

    Token pricing, specs, and benchmarks side by side

    Metric
    Grok-4.1 Thinking
    Mistral Small 4
    Provider
    Provider
    xAI
    Mistral
    License
    Proprietary
    Open Source
    Release Date
    2025-11-17
    2026-03-16
    Pricing (per 1M tokens)
    Input Price+1900%
    $3.00
    $0.15
    Output Price+2400%
    $15.00
    $0.60
    Blended (1M + 1M)
    $18.00
    $0.75
    Model Details
    Context Window
    256K
    256K
    Max Output Tokens
    8K
    256K
    Knowledge Cutoff
    N/A
    N/A
    Throughput
    80 tok/s
    4.3 tok/s
    Benchmarks
    71.2%
    48%
    71.2%
    60%
    83.8%
    58.3%
    62.9%
    39%
    79.3%
    34%
    74.2%
    51%
    78%
    61%
    84%

    Verdict

    Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4: the bottom line

    Both models are closely matched on benchmarks. Mistral Small 4 has the pricing advantage, making it the better value unless Grok-4.1 Thinking's specific capabilities are critical to your workflow.

    Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4 FAQ

    Which is cheaper, Grok-4.1 Thinking or Mistral Small 4?

    As of August 25, 2026, Mistral Small 4 is 96% cheaper on blended LLM API pricing. Mistral Small 4 costs $0.15 per million input tokens and $0.60 per million output tokens ($0.75 blended 1M-in + 1M-out). Grok-4.1 Thinking costs $3.00 / $15.00 per million tokens ($18.00 blended). Sources: https://docs.x.ai/docs/models and https://docs.mistral.ai/platform/pricing/. The cheapest LLM for your app still depends on how many output tokens you generate.

    How much does Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4 cost per million tokens?

    Grok-4.1 Thinking xAI API pricing is $3.00 input and $15.00 output per million tokens via xAI. Mistral Small 4 Mistral API pricing is $0.15 input and $0.60 output per million tokens via Mistral AI. Use those four numbers, not ChatGPT Plus or Claude Pro subscription prices, when you are comparing APIs.

    Which is better for coding, Grok-4.1 Thinking or Mistral Small 4?

    Mistral Small 4 has a published LiveCodeBench score of 63.6%. Grok-4.1 Thinking does not have that eval on this page yet.

    What is the context window for Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4?

    Grok-4.1 Thinking supports a 256K token context window, while Mistral Small 4 supports 256K tokens. Both models have the same context window size. Filling a larger window bills more input tokens, so the cheaper-per-million model can still cost more on long documents.

    Which model performs better on benchmarks, Grok-4.1 Thinking or Mistral Small 4?

    Shared benchmark scores for Grok-4.1 Thinking and Mistral Small 4 are still limited. Check the comparison table for the evals each model has published. Check the comparison table for GPQA Diamond, SWE-bench, MMLU, HLE, and the other evals we track. Token price and benchmark score together are the usual LLM comparison, not either number alone.

    Is Grok-4.1 Thinking or Mistral Small 4 better for production use?

    Both Grok-4.1 Thinking and Mistral Small 4 are production API models. For cost-sensitive production traffic, Mistral Small 4 has better economics on the blended 1M-in + 1M-out scale. For maximum capability, weight the benchmark table for your domain. Many production stacks route cheap models for drafts and a frontier model for the hard turn, which is usually cheaper than sending everything to the expensive API.

    Can I switch between Grok-4.1 Thinking and Mistral Small 4 in my app?

    Yes. Call Grok-4.1 Thinking through xAI and Mistral Small 4 through Mistral AI with separate API keys, or through a gateway that already wraps both. Keep prompts in tokens, not characters, when you estimate the invoice. AnotherWrapper templates can swap providers without rewriting auth and billing.

    How accurate is this Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4 pricing data?

    List rates are the latest published xAI API pricing and Mistral API pricing, quoted per million tokens. Official rate sheets: https://docs.x.ai/docs/models and https://docs.mistral.ai/platform/pricing/. Prompt caching, batch APIs, and committed-use discounts can change the invoice. Benchmark scores are from official publications and independent evals, updated as new numbers land.

    What is the output token limit for Grok-4.1 Thinking and Mistral Small 4?

    Grok-4.1 Thinking supports up to 8K output tokens per request, while Mistral Small 4 supports up to 256K output tokens. Output tokens are usually the expensive half of API pricing, so a higher max output cap is a capability, not a discount.

    Which model has better throughput, Grok-4.1 Thinking or Mistral Small 4?

    Grok-4.1 Thinking runs at approximately 80 tokens/second while Mistral Small 4 runs at 4.3 tokens/second. Grok-4.1 Thinking is faster in raw throughput. Throughput (tokens per second) and time-to-first-token are why two models with the same per-million-token price can still feel different in chat and agents.

    How do I switch the models in this Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4 comparison?

    Use the model pickers at the top of this LLM comparison. Search any model in the index and the URL updates. Open Grok-4.1 Thinking or Mistral Small 4 from the sidebar for the single-model API pricing page, or go back to the LLM pricing table to sort by cheapest blended cost.

    Grok-4.1 Thinking vs Mistral Small 4 pricing

    This comparison covers API pricing, context window, throughput, and benchmark scores. Grok-4.1 Thinking costs $3.00/M input and $15.00/M output. Mistral Small 4 costs $0.15/M input and $0.60/M output via Mistral AI.

    Rank both on the LLM leaderboard, SWE-bench, and Humanity's Last Exam.

    The index

    All Large Language Models

    280 models across 33 providers. Search or jump to a lab — every model page stays linked here.

    Baidu

    1 models

    Inception

    1 models

    inclusionAI

    1 models

    LG AI Research

    1 models

    Nous Research

    1 models

    Sakana AI

    1 models

    StepFun

    1 models

    Tencent

    1 models

    Thinking Machines

    1 models

    Unisound

    1 models

    Upstage

    1 models

    Next step

    You found the model. Now ship the product.

    Auth, billing, and the API layer are already decided. Fork 8 finished AI apps, or have us build the first version with you.