Llama 3.1 70B Instruct vs Mistral Large 2
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct (2024) and Mistral Large 2 (2025) are compact production models from AI at Meta and MistralAI. Llama 3.1 70B Instruct ships a 128k-token context window, while Mistral Large 2 ships a 128k-token context window. On HumanEval, Mistral Large 2 leads by 0.7 pts. This comparison covers specs, pricing, API access, capabilities, benchmarks, input and output token costs, and production fit for coding and agent workloads.
Mistral Large 2 is safer overall; choose Llama 3.1 70B Instruct when provider fit matters.
Decision scorecard
Local evidence first| Signal | Llama 3.1 70B Instruct | Mistral Large 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | provider-routed production | multimodal apps, tool-calling agents, and provider-routed production |
| Decision fit | Coding, RAG, and Long context | Coding, RAG, and Agents |
| Context window | 128k | 128k |
| Cheapest output | $0.40/1M tokens | $2.40/1M tokens |
| Provider routes | 13 tracked | 3 tracked |
| Shared benchmarks | 3 shared | HumanEval leader |
Decision tradeoffs
- Llama 3.1 70B Instruct holds a shared-benchmark lead on Massive Multitask Language Understanding, ahead by 2 points.
- Llama 3.1 70B Instruct has the lower cheapest tracked output price at $0.40/1M tokens.
- Llama 3.1 70B Instruct has broader tracked provider coverage for fallback and route flexibility.
- Local decision data tags Llama 3.1 70B Instruct for Coding, RAG, and Long context.
- Mistral Large 2 holds a shared-benchmark lead on HumanEval, ahead by 0.7 points.
- Mistral Large 2 uniquely exposes Vision, Multimodal, and JSON / Tool use in local model data.
- Local decision data tags Mistral Large 2 for Coding, RAG, and Agents.
Monthly cost at traffic
Estimate token spend from the cheapest tracked input and output route or tier on this page.
Llama 3.1 70B Instruct
$420
Cheapest tracked route/tier: Hyperbolic AI Inference
Mistral Large 2
$984
Cheapest tracked route/tier: AWS Bedrock
Estimated monthly gap: $564. Batch, cache, alternate speed tiers, and negotiated pricing are excluded from this local estimate.
Switch friction
- Provider overlap exists on IBM watsonx and AWS Bedrock; start route-level A/B tests there.
- Mistral Large 2 is $2/1M tokens higher on cheapest tracked output pricing, so quality gains need to justify the spend.
- Mistral Large 2 adds Vision, Multimodal, and JSON / Tool use in local capability data.
- Provider overlap exists on IBM watsonx and AWS Bedrock; start route-level A/B tests there.
- Llama 3.1 70B Instruct is $2/1M 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.
Specs
| Specification | ||
|---|---|---|
| Released | 2024-07-23 | 2025-11-25 |
| Context window | 128k | 128k |
| Parameters | 70B | 123B |
| Architecture | Decoder Only | Decoder Only |
| License | Llama 3 Community | Mistral License |
| Openness | Open weights | Open weights |
| Weights | Available | Unknown |
| Code | Unknown | Unknown |
| Commercial use | Commercial use: conditional | Commercial use: non-commercial |
| Knowledge cutoff | 2023-12 | 2025-07 |
Pricing and availability
| Pricing attribute | Llama 3.1 70B Instruct | Mistral Large 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Input price | $0.40/1M tokens | $0.48/1M tokens |
| Output price | $0.40/1M tokens | $2.40/1M tokens |
| Providers |
Capabilities
| Capability | Llama 3.1 70B Instruct | Mistral Large 2 |
|---|---|---|
| Vision | No | Yes |
| Multimodal | No | Yes |
| Reasoning | No | No |
| JSON / Tool use | No | Yes |
| Structured outputs | Yes | Yes |
| Code execution | No | No |
| IDE integration | No | No |
| Computer use | No | No |
| Parallel agents | No | No |
Benchmarks
| Benchmark | Llama 3.1 70B Instruct | Mistral Large 2 |
|---|---|---|
| HumanEval | 84.1 | 84.8 |
| Massive Multitask Language Understanding | 86.0 | 84.0 |
| HellaSwag | 94.2 | 93.8 |
Continue comparing
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Last reviewed: 2026-07-11. Data sourced from public model cards and provider documentation.