Llama Guard 4 12B vs Mistral Small 4
Llama Guard 4 12B (2025) and Mistral Small 4 (2026) are general-purpose language models from AI at Meta and MistralAI. Llama Guard 4 12B ships a 164k-token context window, while Mistral Small 4 ships a 256k-token context window. On pricing, Mistral Small 4 costs $0.10/1M input tokens versus $0.18/1M for the alternative. This comparison covers specs, pricing, API access, capabilities, benchmarks, input and output token costs, and production fit for coding and agent workloads.
Mistral Small 4 is ~80% cheaper at $0.10/1M; pay for Llama Guard 4 12B only for provider fit.
Decision scorecard
Local evidence first| Signal | Llama Guard 4 12B | Mistral Small 4 |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | provider-routed production | multimodal apps, tool-calling agents, and provider-routed production |
| Decision fit | RAG, Long context, and Classification | RAG, Agents, and Long context |
| Context window | 164k | 256k |
| Cheapest output | $0.18/1M tokens | $0.30/1M tokens |
| Provider routes | 3 tracked | 3 tracked |
| Shared benchmarks | 0 shared | 0 shared |
Decision tradeoffs
- Llama Guard 4 12B has the lower cheapest tracked output price at $0.18/1M tokens.
- Llama Guard 4 12B uniquely exposes Structured outputs in local model data.
- Local decision data tags Llama Guard 4 12B for RAG, Long context, and Classification.
- Mistral Small 4 has the larger context window for long prompts, retrieval packs, or transcript analysis.
- Mistral Small 4 uniquely exposes Vision, Multimodal, and JSON / Tool use in local model data.
- Local decision data tags Mistral Small 4 for RAG, Agents, and Long context.
Monthly cost at traffic
Estimate token spend from the cheapest tracked input and output route or tier on this page.
Llama Guard 4 12B
$189
Cheapest tracked route/tier: OpenRouter
Mistral Small 4
$155
Cheapest tracked route/tier: Mistral AI Studio
Estimated monthly gap: $34.00. Batch, cache, alternate speed tiers, and negotiated pricing are excluded from this local estimate.
Switch friction
- Provider overlap exists on OpenRouter and NVIDIA NIM; start route-level A/B tests there.
- Mistral Small 4 is $0.12/1M tokens higher on cheapest tracked output pricing, so quality gains need to justify the spend.
- Check replacement coverage for Structured outputs before moving production traffic.
- Mistral Small 4 adds Vision, Multimodal, and JSON / Tool use in local capability data.
- Provider overlap exists on NVIDIA NIM and OpenRouter; start route-level A/B tests there.
- Llama Guard 4 12B is $0.12/1M tokens lower on cheapest tracked output pricing before cache, batch, or negotiated discounts.
- Check replacement coverage for Vision, Multimodal, and JSON / Tool use before moving production traffic.
- Llama Guard 4 12B adds Structured outputs in local capability data.
Specs
| Specification | ||
|---|---|---|
| Released | 2025-04-05 | 2026-03-16 |
| Context window | 164k | 256k |
| Parameters | 12B | 119B (6.5B active) |
| Architecture | Decoder Only | Mixture of Experts |
| License | Llama 2 Community | Apache 2.0OSI-approved |
| Openness | Open weights | Open source |
| Weights | Unknown | Available |
| Code | Unknown | Unknown |
| Commercial use | Commercial use: conditional | Commercial use: permitted |
| Knowledge cutoff | 2024-08 | 2025-06 |
Pricing and availability
| Pricing attribute | Llama Guard 4 12B | Mistral Small 4 |
|---|---|---|
| Input price | $0.18/1M tokens | $0.10/1M tokens |
| Output price | $0.18/1M tokens | $0.30/1M tokens |
| Providers |
Capabilities
| Capability | Llama Guard 4 12B | Mistral Small 4 |
|---|---|---|
| Vision | No | Yes |
| Multimodal | No | Yes |
| Reasoning | No | No |
| JSON / Tool use | No | Yes |
| Structured outputs | Yes | No |
| Code execution | No | No |
| IDE integration | No | No |
| Computer use | No | No |
| Parallel agents | No | No |
Benchmarks
No shared benchmark scores are currently available for this pair.
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Last reviewed: 2026-07-09. Data sourced from public model cards and provider documentation.