Hunyuan Hy4 vs Mistral Medium 3
Tencent · China | Mistral AI · France · Updated June 2026
Quick verdict
Pick Hunyuan Hy4 for first hunyuan model with vision and computer use, adding image input to the text-only hy4 preview or tencent-reported gains over the preview of 19.1% on gamedev and 9.8% on gamelogic. Pick Mistral Medium 3 for strong cost-to-capability at $0.40/$2.00 or general reasoning, coding and multimodal tasks. On a tight budget at scale, Mistral Medium 3 is the value pick.
Hunyuan Hy4 (Tencent, China) and Mistral Medium 3 (Mistral AI, France) line up two different AI ecosystems against each other — a comparison that is as much about cost philosophy and openness as raw capability. Hunyuan Hy4 is tencent's November 4, 2026 full Hy4 release - a 1M-context model that adds vision and computer use at about $0.90/$2.70, with weights promised but not yet public. Mistral Medium 3 is mistral's mid-tier model at $0.40/$2.00 — efficient general capability with a 128K window, below the 1M-context frontier tier. They diverge most on price and context window — each quantified below from the models' real specs.
Key differences at a glance
- ▸Price: Mistral Medium 3 is about 2.3× cheaper on input ($0.4/$2 per 1M tokens vs $0.9/$2.7 per 1M tokens) — meaningful once you are processing millions of tokens a month.
- ▸Context window: Hunyuan Hy4 holds 8.2× more — 1M tokens (~1,573 pages) vs 128K (~192 pages). But effective recall usually fades long before the advertised ceiling, so the bigger number only helps if the model reasons over it.
- ▸Recency: Hunyuan Hy4 is the newer model by about 18 months (released November 4, 2026), usually meaning fresher training data and capabilities.
- ▸Ecosystem: this is a China-vs-France matchup — they differ in pricing philosophy, data-residency options, and tooling ecosystems, not only benchmarks.
Side-by-side specs
| Spec | Hunyuan Hy4 | Mistral Medium 3 |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Tencent (China) | Mistral AI (France) |
| Released | November 4, 2026 | May 7, 2025 |
| Context window | 1M tokens (~1,573 pages) | 128K (~192 pages) |
| Price (in/out) | $0.9/$2.7 per 1M tokens | $0.4/$2 per 1M tokens |
| Open weight? | No — API only | No — API only |
| Modalities | text, image, code | text, image, code |
| SWE-Bench Verified | Not published | Not published |
| MRCR v2 @ 1M | Not published | Not published |
Who wins what
First Hunyuan model with vision and computer use, adding image input to the text-only Hy4 Preview
Hunyuan Hy4
Mistral Medium 3 is comparatively weak here — a mid-tier model, not a frontier reasoner
Tencent-reported gains over the preview of 19.1% on GameDev and 9.8% on GameLogic
Hunyuan Hy4
Tencent's November 4, 2026 full Hy4 release - a 1M-context model that adds vision and computer use at about $0.90/$2.70, with weights promised but not yet public — and it carries the larger 1M tokens context.
Tencent-reported financial evaluation of 3.04, ahead of DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 at 2.97
Hunyuan Hy4
Tencent's November 4, 2026 full Hy4 release - a 1M-context model that adds vision and computer use at about $0.90/$2.70, with weights promised but not yet public — and it is the newer of the two.
Strong cost-to-capability at $0.40/$2.00
Mistral Medium 3
At $0.4/$2 per 1M tokens it undercuts Hunyuan Hy4 ($0.9/$2.7 per 1M tokens), and that gap compounds at volume.
General reasoning, coding and multimodal tasks
Mistral Medium 3
Mistral's mid-tier model at $0.40/$2.00 — efficient general capability with a 128K window, below the 1M-context frontier tier — and it runs cheaper at $0.4/$2 per 1M tokens.
Efficient mid-tier deployment for production workloads
Mistral Medium 3
Mistral Medium 3 lists efficient mid-tier deployment for production workloads among its strengths; Hunyuan Hy4 does not.
Lowest cost at scale
Mistral Medium 3
At $0.4/$2 per 1M tokens, it is the cheaper of the two — the gap dominates the bill on high-volume workloads.
Largest single-prompt input
Hunyuan Hy4
Its 1M tokens window is about 8.2× larger than Mistral Medium 3's 128K, fitting roughly 1,573 pages in one prompt.
Which should you pick?
A cost-sensitive startup shipping high volume
→ Mistral Medium 3
At $0.4/$2 per 1M tokens it undercuts Hunyuan Hy4, and on millions of tokens that margin decides the monthly bill.
Someone analysing very long documents or codebases
→ Hunyuan Hy4
Larger 1M tokens window fits more in one prompt.
Anyone whose priority is first hunyuan model with vision and computer use, adding image input to the text-only hy4 preview
→ Hunyuan Hy4
It is specifically built for that.
Anyone whose priority is strong cost-to-capability at $0.40/$2.00
→ Mistral Medium 3
That is its strongest area.
An enterprise with regional data-residency rules
→ Mistral Medium 3 or Hunyuan Hy4
Origin (China vs France) affects where data is processed and which compliance regime applies — check the provider's terms for your region.
Hunyuan Hy4: where it fits
Tencent's November 4, 2026 full Hy4 release - a 1M-context model that adds vision and computer use at about $0.90/$2.70, with weights promised but not yet public. Released November 4, 2026 by Tencent, it is built for first Hunyuan model with vision and computer use, adding image input to the text-only Hy4 Preview, tencent-reported gains over the preview of 19.1% on GameDev and 9.8% on GameLogic, tencent-reported financial evaluation of 3.04, ahead of DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017 at 2.97, and about $0.90/$2.70 per million tokens, with 50% off on Tencent Cloud TokenHub through December 31, 2026 (OpenRouter lists $0.417/$1.25 with that discount).
Its trade-offs are real: weights not public as of November 5, 2026 - Tencent says weights and system cards will come in the coming days, and no license is announced yet, only the earlier Hy4 Preview is downloadable today (Apache 2.0), published improvements are Tencent's own and mostly relative to the preview, with no SWE-bench Verified figure, and sources differ on list price: Tencent says about $0.90/$2.70, while OpenRouter and Vals show $0.83/$2.50. At $0.9 in / $2.7 out per million tokens, it sits in the budget price band.
Mistral Medium 3: where it fits
Mistral's mid-tier model at $0.40/$2.00 — efficient general capability with a 128K window, below the 1M-context frontier tier. Released May 7, 2025 by Mistral AI, it is built for strong cost-to-capability at $0.40/$2.00, general reasoning, coding and multimodal tasks, efficient mid-tier deployment for production workloads, and text and image input.
Its trade-offs: a 128K context — smaller than the 1M-window flagships here, no published SWE-Bench Verified score, a mid-tier model, not a frontier reasoner, and proprietary, unlike Mistral's open-weight releases. At $0.4 in / $2 out per million tokens, it sits in the budget price band.
The bottom line for this matchup
This is less "which is smarter" and more "which ecosystem fits." Hunyuan Hy4 (China) and Mistral Medium 3 (France) differ on pricing philosophy, data-residency, and tooling as much as on raw scores. Mistral Medium 3 is the cheaper option, which matters at volume. The pragmatic move is to run one real task through both and judge the outputs against your own constraints — including where your data is allowed to be processed.
Want both Hunyuan Hy4 and Mistral Medium 3 without two subscriptions? LumiChats gives you these plus 40+ models under one ₹69/day pass (about $1/day) — draft with one, cross-check with the other.
See pricingFrequently asked questions
Is Hunyuan Hy4 or Mistral Medium 3 better for coding?
Public SWE-Bench figures are not available for either model, so the honest test is your own repository — run an identical real bug through both. By design, Hunyuan Hy4 leans toward first hunyuan model with vision and computer use, adding image input to the text-only hy4 preview while Mistral Medium 3 leans toward strong cost-to-capability at $0.40/$2.00, and that positioning usually predicts which feels better on your codebase.
Which is cheaper, Hunyuan Hy4 or Mistral Medium 3?
Mistral Medium 3 is cheaper — $0.9/$2.7 per 1M tokens vs $0.4/$2 per 1M tokens, roughly 2.3× apart on input.
Which has the bigger context window?
Hunyuan Hy4 — 1M tokens vs 128K, about 8.2× larger. Useful only if the model actually reasons over the full window, which not all do.
Can I use both Hunyuan Hy4 and Mistral Medium 3 together?
Yes — a multi-model platform like LumiChats gives you Hunyuan Hy4, Mistral Medium 3 and 40+ others under one ₹69/day pass (about $1/day), so you can draft with one and cross-check with the other instead of buying two subscriptions.
Which is newer, Hunyuan Hy4 or Mistral Medium 3?
Hunyuan Hy4 — released November 4, 2026, about 18 months after Mistral Medium 3.
Related comparisons
Specifications and benchmarks reflect publicly reported figures as of June 2026 and may change as providers release updates. Always verify on your own workload.