AI Models · Open-Source vs Paid

Mistral Medium 3.5 Open vs Sonar Deep Research Paid

Mistral Medium 3.5 vs Sonar Deep Research compared — price per token, context window, multimodality, openness and which to choose. Can the open-source model replace the paid one? Full 2026 breakdown.

Sonar Deep Research — full profile ›

Prices & specs refreshed from live data · olud.ai

Open-model prices = cheapest provider via OpenRouter; official maker rates may be higher.

Mistral Medium 3.5OpenMistral AI

$1.5 /M input
$7.5 /M outputNo per-token fees if you self-host

TypeOpen-weight

Context window262K tokens

MultimodalYes

Self-hostYes

Sonar Deep ResearchPaidPerplexity

$2 /M input
$8 /M outputManaged API (no infra to run)

TypeProprietary

Context window128K tokens

MultimodalNo

Self-hostNo

Choose Mistral Medium 3.5 if you want to self-host, keep your data private and skip per-token fees — it's open-weight and runs on your own hardware. Choose Sonar Deep Research if you want frontier capability through a managed API with zero infrastructure to run.

Mistral Medium 3.5 vs Sonar Deep Research specs

Spec	Mistral Medium 3.5	Sonar Deep Research	Winner
Maker	Mistral AI	Perplexity	–
Type	Open-weight	Proprietary	Mistral Medium 3.5
Context window	262K tokens	128K tokens	Mistral Medium 3.5
Input price	$1.5/M · free self-host	$2/M	Mistral Medium 3.5
Output price	$7.5/M · free self-host	$8/M	Mistral Medium 3.5
Vision / multimodal	Yes	No	Mistral Medium 3.5
Tool / function calling	Yes	No	Mistral Medium 3.5
Self-hostable	Yes	No (API only)	Mistral Medium 3.5
License	Apache 2.0	Proprietary	Mistral Medium 3.5

Price gap & when to choose each

Choose Mistral Medium 3.5 if…

You want to self-host or run on your cloud
You need the longer 262K context window
You prioritize data privacy & control
You want the lowest operating costs
You are building open or reproducible AI

Choose Sonar Deep Research if…

You want frontier performance through a managed API
You value reliability & ecosystem
You don't want to manage infrastructure

Feature comparison

Capability	Mistral Medium 3.5	Sonar Deep Research
Open weights (downloadable)	✓	✗
Self-hostable	✓	✗
Runs fully offline	✓	✗
Vision / multimodal	✓	✗
Tool / function calling	✓	✗
1M+ context window	✗	✗

Benchmarks: Mistral Medium 3.5 vs Sonar Deep Research

Independent benchmark scores measured by Artificial Analysis. Higher is better (except latency).

Mistral Medium 3.5

Sonar Deep Research

Intelligence index

14.9

–

Coding index

46.9

–

GPQA

74.8%

–

Humanity's Last Exam

13.8%

–

Long Context Reasoning

69.3%

–

SciCode

40.2%

–

IFBench

68.8%

–

τ²-Bench

94.2%

–

τ-Bench Banking

15.1%

–

Terminal-Bench

50.6%

–

Terminal-Bench Hard

33.3%

–

Speed

142.2 tok/s

–

Latency

0.74s

–

Intelligence per $

–

Benchmark data by Artificial Analysis.

How Mistral Medium 3.5 and Sonar Deep Research score

🏆 Best value & openness: Mistral Medium 3.5 (4.6 vs 2.3 / 5)

Criterion	Mistral Medium 3.5	Sonar Deep Research
Cost-efficiency	4.0	3.5
Context window	4.0	3.5
Openness	5.0	1.5
Self-hosting	5.0	1.0
Multimodality	5.0	2.0

Scores come from live data — output price (cost), context length, open vs closed weights (openness & self-hosting) and vision/tool support (multimodality). Raw task quality isn't scored here; it depends on your benchmark — see the verdict.

What each model is

Mistral Medium 3.5 Open

Mistral AI · Open-weight

Mistral Medium 3.5 is a dense 128B instruction-following model from Mistral AI. It supports text and image inputs with text output, and is designed for agentic workflows, coding, and complex...

Sonar Deep Research Paid

Perplexity · Proprietary

Sonar Deep Research is a research-focused model designed for multi-step retrieval, synthesis, and reasoning across complex topics. It autonomously searches, reads, and evaluates sources, refining its approach as it gathers...

Other models in these families

These variants are tracked but not compared here — one page per family keeps the comparison readable.

Other variants tracked

Mistral Medium 3.5 (batch)Mistral Small 4Mistral Small 4 (batch)Mistral Medium 3.1Mistral Medium 3.1 (batch)Mistral Large 3 2512Mistral Large 3 2512 (batch)Devstral 2 2512Mistral Medium 3Mistral Small 3.1 24BMistral Small 3.2 24BMistral LargeMistral Large 2407Mistral Small 3SabaMinistral 3 14B 2512Mixtral 8x22B InstructMinistral 3 8B 2512Ministral 3 8B 2512 (batch)Ministral 3 3B 2512UncensoredCodestral 2508Codestral 2508 (batch)Voxtral Small 24B 2507Mistral Nemo

Frequently asked questions

Is Mistral Medium 3.5 as good as Sonar Deep Research?

Mistral Medium 3.5 is open-weight and competitive on many tasks, but Sonar Deep Research may still lead on the hardest reasoning and agentic work. The gap keeps narrowing — benchmark both on your actual use case before deciding.

Can I run Mistral Medium 3.5 locally?

Yes. Mistral Medium 3.5 has open weights, so you can self-host it on your own GPUs or run it via a low-cost API. Sonar Deep Research is API-only and cannot be self-hosted.

Mistral Medium 3.5 vs Sonar Deep Research — which should I pick in 2026?

Choose Mistral Medium 3.5 if you want to self-host, keep your data private and skip per-token fees — it's open-weight and runs on your own hardware. Choose Sonar Deep Research if you want frontier capability through a managed API with zero infrastructure to run.

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