DeepSeek V3.1 Terminus vs Ministral 3 8B 2512

Summary of our 12-test suite (scores are from our testing):

• Long context: DeepSeek 5 (tied for 1st of 55) vs Ministral 4 (rank 38). DeepSeek is demonstrably stronger for retrieval and summarization across 30K+ tokens.
• Structured output: DeepSeek 5 (tied for 1st) vs Ministral 4 (rank 26). DeepSeek better adheres to JSON schemas and strict formats.
• Strategic analysis: DeepSeek 5 (tied for 1st) vs Ministral 3 (rank 36). DeepSeek gives superior nuanced tradeoff reasoning with numbers.
• Creative problem solving: DeepSeek 4 (rank 9) vs Ministral 3 (rank 30). DeepSeek produces more non-obvious, feasible ideas in our tests.
• Agentic planning: DeepSeek 4 (rank 16) vs Ministral 3 (rank 42). DeepSeek decomposes goals and failure recovery more reliably.
• Multilingual: DeepSeek 5 (tied for 1st) vs Ministral 4 (rank 36). DeepSeek maintains equivalent quality in non-English outputs in our runs. Where Ministral wins:
• Constrained rewriting: Ministral 5 (tied for 1st) vs DeepSeek 3 (rank 31). Ministral is superior when outputs must fit tight character/byte limits.
• Tool calling: Ministral 4 (rank 18) vs DeepSeek 3 (rank 47). In our tests Ministral selects functions, arguments and sequencing more accurately.
• Faithfulness: Ministral 4 (rank 34) vs DeepSeek 3 (rank 52). Ministral sticks to source material more often in our probes.
• Classification: Ministral 4 (tied for 1st) vs DeepSeek 3 (rank 31). Ministral routes and categorizes more accurately in our classification tasks.
• Persona consistency: Ministral 5 (tied for 1st) vs DeepSeek 4 (rank 38). Ministral resists prompt injection and maintains character better in our runs. Tie:
• Safety calibration: both score 1 in our testing (tie) — both models show the same low score on refusing/allowing tests in our suite. Interpretation: DeepSeek is the reliable choice for very long-context work, strict structured outputs, and complex analysis. Ministral is stronger and more efficient for constrained rewriting, tooling, classification, persona stability, and is multimodal (text+image→text) per the payload.

All pricing below uses the payload's per-mtok rates and a simple conversion: cost = rate × (tokens / 1,000). Output-only costs (common in many apps):

• 1M output tokens: DeepSeek = $0.79 × 1,000 = $790; Ministral = $0.15 × 1,000 = $150.
• 10M output tokens: DeepSeek = $7,900; Ministral = $1,500.
• 100M output tokens: DeepSeek = $79,000; Ministral = $15,000. If you assume a 50/50 split of input/output tokens, per-1M combined cost is:
• DeepSeek: (0.21+0.79) × 500 = $500; Ministral: (0.15+0.15) × 500 = $150. Practical takeaway: DeepSeek's output rate is 5.27× higher (0.79 vs 0.15/mtok). Teams doing high-volume output or cost-sensitive consumer apps should favor Ministral to cut cloud spend; teams that need the specific quality wins below may justify DeepSeek's higher cost.

Choose DeepSeek V3.1 Terminus if you need best-in-class long-context handling, strict JSON/schema output, strategic numerical reasoning, agentic planning, or multilingual parity and you can absorb higher output costs (DeepSeek output = $0.79/mtok). Choose Ministral 3 8B 2512 if you need cost-efficient inference, constrained rewriting, robust tool-calling and classification, stronger faithfulness and persona consistency in our tests, or if you require text+image→text multimodal support — it costs $0.15/mtok for output.