DeepSeek Coder 2.0 vs Ministral 3 8B

Side-by-side benchmark comparison across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, and math workflows.

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 is clearly ahead on the aggregate, 66 to 32. The gap is large enough that you do not need to squint at the spreadsheet to see the difference.

DeepSeek Coder 2.0's sharpest advantage is in reasoning, where it averages 75.5 against 36.1. The single biggest benchmark swing on the page is HumanEval, 82 to 23.

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 is also the more expensive model on tokens at $0.27 input / $1.10 output per 1M tokens, versus $0.00 input / $0.00 output per 1M tokens for Ministral 3 8B. That is roughly Infinityx on output cost alone.

Quick Verdict

Pick DeepSeek Coder 2.0 if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Ministral 3 8B only becomes the better choice if you want the cheaper token bill.

Agentic

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

67.5

Ministral 3 8B

28.9

73
Terminal-Bench 2.0
26
62
BrowseComp
36
65
OSWorld-Verified
27

Coding

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

52.8

Ministral 3 8B

14.2

82
HumanEval
23
51
SWE-bench Verified
16
45
LiveCodeBench
15
61
SWE-bench Pro
13

Multimodal & Grounded

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

58.6

Ministral 3 8B

32.4

50
MMMU-Pro
27
69
OfficeQA Pro
39

Reasoning

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

75.5

Ministral 3 8B

36.1

78
SimpleQA
28
76
MuSR
26
84
BBH
63
73
LongBench v2
38
71
MRCRv2
41

Knowledge

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

59.6

Ministral 3 8B

28

80
MMLU
28
79
GPQA
27
77
SuperGPQA
25
75
OpenBookQA
23
73
MMLU-Pro
52
14
HLE
3
72
FrontierScience
32

Instruction Following

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

86

Ministral 3 8B

69

86
IFEval
69

Multilingual

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

79.8

Ministral 3 8B

61.7

83
MGSM
63
78
MMLU-ProX
61

Mathematics

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

DeepSeek Coder 2.0

80.5

Ministral 3 8B

43.3

81
AIME 2023
30
83
AIME 2024
32
82
AIME 2025
33
77
HMMT Feb 2023
26
79
HMMT Feb 2024
28
78
HMMT Feb 2025
27
80
BRUMO 2025
29
81
MATH-500
60

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 is ahead overall, 66 to 32. The biggest single separator in this matchup is HumanEval, where the scores are 82 and 23.

Which is better for knowledge tasks, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for knowledge tasks in this comparison, averaging 59.6 versus 28. Inside this category, MMLU is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for coding, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for coding in this comparison, averaging 52.8 versus 14.2. Inside this category, HumanEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for math, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for math in this comparison, averaging 80.5 versus 43.3. Inside this category, AIME 2023 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for reasoning, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for reasoning in this comparison, averaging 75.5 versus 36.1. Inside this category, SimpleQA is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for agentic tasks, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for agentic tasks in this comparison, averaging 67.5 versus 28.9. Inside this category, Terminal-Bench 2.0 is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multimodal and grounded tasks, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for multimodal and grounded tasks in this comparison, averaging 58.6 versus 32.4. Inside this category, OfficeQA Pro is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for instruction following, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for instruction following in this comparison, averaging 86 versus 69. Inside this category, IFEval is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Which is better for multilingual tasks, DeepSeek Coder 2.0 or Ministral 3 8B?

DeepSeek Coder 2.0 has the edge for multilingual tasks in this comparison, averaging 79.8 versus 61.7. Inside this category, MGSM is the benchmark that creates the most daylight between them.

Last updated: March 12, 2026

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