gpt-oss-20b vs Mistral Small 3 (24B, 2501): the real cost to run each

The honest, $0-markup cost to run gpt-oss-20b (OpenAI, 21B) and Mistral Small 3 (24B, 2501) (Mistral AI, 23.6B), side by side — free on your own machine, on your own rented GPU at the vendor's price, or via your own API key.

gpt-oss-20b vs Mistral Small 3 (24B, 2501) — cost comparison

Which should you pick?

• Easiest to run locally: gpt-oss-20b (needs ~15 GB VRAM at its default quant).
• Cheapest via your own API key: Mistral Small 3 (24B, 2501) ($0.07/1M blended).
• Cheapest to rent by the hour: Either.
• Longest context: gpt-oss-20b (131.1K tokens).

VRAM, size, context and license are facts from the catalog and the shared cost engine; API prices are real where we have them (labeled "est." otherwise). We don't rank model quality or quote benchmarks here.

Full cost breakdown: gpt-oss-20b →
Full cost breakdown: Mistral Small 3 (24B, 2501) →

Open the free Spanvero advisor → to compare them live for your exact workload and hardware.

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Spanvero · All comparisons · Prices as of 2026-07-06. $0 markup, your own accounts, we never resell compute. © 2026 Cynosure LLC.