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Mistral AI vs OpenScale
Mistral sells its own open-weight models from Europe across every major cloud. OpenScale sells DeepSeek V4.1 Flash cheaply on one serverless API.
By The Subconscious Team · Updated
Mistral AI vs OpenScale: key differences
Mistral's lineup runs from Small 4 at $0.15 in and $0.60 out to Medium 3.5 at $1.50 in and $7.50 out, with a 256K context on most models and 1M on Large 4 in preview. It offers EU and US regions, a Priority Tier with uptime SLAs, and the same models on Azure, Bedrock and Vertex AI. OpenScale serves DeepSeek V4.1 Flash with a 1M context at $0.06 in, $0.003 cached and $0.24 out under a 50% promotion, at 200+ tokens per second.
Mistral fits teams with data residency rules or cloud-credit budgets, and teams that want open weights they can later self-host. OpenScale fits teams chasing the lowest price on a strong open model for coding agents, if a single model, a Singapore datacenter and no SLA are acceptable.
What Mistral AI and OpenScale do
Mistral AI
Mistral AI is a Paris lab that sells its models through La Plateforme, its own API, and releases most of them as open weights. It consolidated the lineup in 2026. Mistral Medium 3.5, released April 28, is a dense 128B model that merges instruction following, reasoning and coding into one set of weights, and it replaced both Devstral 2 and the Magistral reasoning models. It costs $1.50 in and $7.50 out per million tokens and scores 77.6% on SWE-Bench Verified by Mistral's count. Mistral Small 4, a 119B mixture-of-experts model with 6.5B active, costs $0.15 in and $0.60 out. Mistral Large 3, a 675B MoE under Apache 2.0, runs $0.50 in and $1.50 out. All three carry a 256K context window. Mistral Large 4, a 1.05T multimodal MoE with 52B active, entered public preview on October 6, 2026 with a 1M context at $1.36 in and $4.18 out. Its weights are due at the end of October.
Example models: Mistral Large 4, Mistral Medium 3.5
Full Mistral AI profileOpenScale
OpenScale is a Y Combinator-backed inference API built by LatentSpace and run out of Singapore. It sells open models behind one endpoint that speaks Chat Completions, the OpenAI Responses API and Anthropic Messages, so Claude Code, Codex, OpenCode, Cline, GitHub Copilot, Zed and other coding agents can point at it with a base URL and key. Its public catalog today is DeepSeek V4.1 Flash in two versions, standard and fast, both with a 1M token context window and up to 384K output tokens.
Example models: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash
Full OpenScale profileShould you choose Mistral AI or OpenScale?
Mistral AI
Choose Mistral AI for
- EU or US data residency
- Uptime SLAs on a Priority Tier
- Buying through Azure, Bedrock or Vertex
OpenScale
Choose OpenScale for
- Cheaper tokens with a 1M context
- Cache-heavy coding agents
- Quick setup in Claude Code or Codex
Mistral AI vs OpenScale at a glance
| Attribute | Mistral AI | OpenScale |
|---|---|---|
| Model access | Open weights, plus closed Codestral | Open weights |
| Flagship models | Mistral Large 4, Medium 3.5, Small 4, Large 3 | DeepSeek V4.1 Flash |
| Speed | Unknown | 200+ tok/s; fast tier ~2x |
| Price | $0.15–$1.50 in, $0.60–$7.50 out per 1M | $0.06 in, $0.24 out (promo, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash) |
| Customization | Forge (enterprise); fine-tuning API deprecated | N/A |
| Deployment | API, Azure, Bedrock, Vertex, self-host | Serverless API |
| Long context | 1M (Large 4 preview); 256K on others | 1M context |
Frequently asked questions
What is the difference between Mistral AI and OpenScale?
Mistral sells its own open-weight models from Europe across every major cloud. OpenScale sells DeepSeek V4.1 Flash cheaply on one serverless API.
When should I choose Mistral AI over OpenScale?
EU or US data residency; Uptime SLAs on a Priority Tier; Buying through Azure, Bedrock or Vertex.
When should I choose OpenScale over Mistral AI?
Cheaper tokens with a 1M context; Cache-heavy coding agents; Quick setup in Claude Code or Codex.
Is Mistral AI or OpenScale cheaper?
Mistral AI: $0.15–$1.50 in, $0.60–$7.50 out per 1M. OpenScale: $0.06 in, $0.24 out (promo, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash). The cheaper choice depends on the model and workload.
Which has more context, Mistral AI or OpenScale?
Mistral AI: 1M (Large 4 preview); 256K on others. OpenScale: 1M context.
Related comparisons
Running long-horizon agents?
If your agents run past 200K tokens, compare both against Subconscious. Our inference stack treats a long-horizon trace as the primary workload, so speed, cost, and accuracy hold up deep into the trace.