comparison
Claude Opus 4.8 vs Mistral Medium 3.5
Token pricing, context window and real monthly cost, side by side. Mistral Medium 3.5 is the cheaper of the two for a typical workload — about 3.3× less.
Positioned by published specs — size, context and modality — not measured performance; a smaller model can sometimes outperform a larger one on your task.
Claude Opus 4.8 is one class larger (Flagship vs Mid). Lean to the cheaper Mistral Medium 3.5 unless your task is demanding enough to need the larger class.
| metric | Claude Opus 4.8 | Mistral Medium 3.5 |
|---|---|---|
| Input / 1M | $5.00 | $1.50 |
| Output / 1M | $25.00 | $7.50 |
| Context | 1M | 262K |
| Technical class | Flagship | Mid |
| Cost @ typical workload | $4,000/mo | $1,200/mo |
| Modality | text + image | text + image |
| Price source | list | list |
| Provider | Anthropic | Mistral |
Snapshot . Cost uses a typical workload; tune it in the calculator. How we measure →
Which should you pick?
On a typical workload, Mistral Medium 3.5 costs $1,200/mo against Claude Opus 4.8's $4,000/mo — roughly 3.3× cheaper. But the ranking depends on your output-to-input ratio: output is the pricier direction for both, so an output-heavy job (code generation, long answers) widens the gap while an input-heavy one (summarization, retrieval) narrows it. If you need to fit more in a single prompt, Claude Opus 4.8 has the larger 1M-token window (~1,500 pages). By technical class (size and context, not measured capability), Claude Opus 4.8 is a Flagship and Mistral Medium 3.5 a Mid — so the lower price partly reflects a smaller class, not just a discount.
These are list and routed market prices, not measured outcomes. Two models at the same rate can still cost different amounts to finish the same task, because verbose or reasoning-heavy models emit more tokens. That gap is exactly what measured cost-per-task captures. The technical-class read above is likewise spec-based — size, context and modality, not measured performance — so a smaller model can still outperform a larger one on your specific task.
Frequently asked questions
Is Claude Opus 4.8 or Mistral Medium 3.5 cheaper?
For a typical workload (1,500 input + 500 output tokens × 200,000 requests/month), Mistral Medium 3.5 costs $1,200/mo versus $4,000/mo for Claude Opus 4.8 — about 3.3× less. Because output is priced higher than input, the winner can flip if your workload writes much more or less than this; check your own numbers in the calculator.
What's the main difference between Claude Opus 4.8 and Mistral Medium 3.5?
On price, Claude Opus 4.8 is $5.00/$25.00 per 1M (in/out) and Mistral Medium 3.5 is $1.50/$7.50. By technical class (size & context) it's Flagship (Claude Opus 4.8) versus Mid (Mistral Medium 3.5). Claude Opus 4.8 has the larger context window at 1M tokens.
Why is Mistral Medium 3.5 so much cheaper than Claude Opus 4.8?
Mistral Medium 3.5 has a much lower per-token rate — $7.50/1M output versus $25.00, and it's a smaller technical class (Mid vs Flagship). The headline rate isn't the whole story, though: a verbose model can cost more to finish a task than its rate implies — that's what measured cost-per-task captures.
Which handles longer prompts, Claude Opus 4.8 or Mistral Medium 3.5?
Claude Opus 4.8 — its 1M-token context window (~1,500 pages of text) is the larger of the two, by roughly 4×.
More comparisons
- GPT-5.5 vs Claude Opus 4.8
- GPT-5.5 vs Mistral Medium 3.5
- Claude Opus 4.8 vs GPT-5.4
- GPT-5.4 vs Mistral Medium 3.5
- Mistral Medium 3.5 vs GPT-5.4 mini
- Claude Fable 5 vs Claude Opus 4.8
Related
- Claude Opus 4.8 and Mistral Medium 3.5 — full specs and price history.
- API cost calculator — compare on your own workload.
- All comparisons — the full head-to-head index.