Mercury 2 vs MiniMax M3
API pricing, context window and capabilities for Mercury 2 and MiniMax M3, side by side. Prices are the cheapest listed serving route per 1M tokens, from LiteLLM and OpenRouter.
Verdict
computed from the published numbersMiniMax M3 wins on Terminal-Bench, on intelligence and on context window.
Price
Tied
Terminal-Bench
MiniMax M3
Intelligence
MiniMax M3
Context window
MiniMax M3
Key takeaways
who wins on what, from the published numbersMercury 2 wins
- Cheaper output ($0.75 vs $0.96 /1M)
MiniMax M3 wins
- Cheaper input ($0.25 vs $0.23 /1M)
- Larger context window (128K vs 1M)
- Higher max output (50K vs 1M)
- More serving providers (3 vs 11)
- Supports vision
- Has reasoning mode
Cheaper overall
Mercury 2
$0.25 + $0.75 /1M
Larger context
MiniMax M3
1M
More providers
MiniMax M3
11 providers
Pricing & specs
cheapest listed route · per 1M tokensOn-demand listed rates, OpenRouter routed quotes and Vercel reseller quotes. Enterprise commitments can be materially lower.
| Mercury 2 | MiniMax M3 | |
|---|---|---|
| Input $/1M | $0.25via Inception | $0.23via Wandb best |
| Output $/1M | $0.75via Inception best | $0.96via Wandb |
| Context window | 128K | 1M best |
| Max output | 50K | 1M best |
| Serving providers | 3 | 11 best |
| Date | Released Feb 24, 2026 | Released Jun 1, 2026 |
Benchmarks
Benchmark scores, side by side| Mercury 2 | MiniMax M3 | |
|---|---|---|
| Intelligence | 13.8 | 29.2 best |
| Terminal-Bench | 27% | 65% best |
| GPQA Diamond | 77% | 93% best |
| Output speed | 554 t/s best | 107 t/s |
| Latency (TTFT) | 6.83s | 1.21s best |
Cost calculator
choose a serving route for each sideInput tokens / month
Output tokens / month
Mercury 2
via Inception
$2.00
MiniMax M3
via Wandb
$2.11
Capabilities
feature support, side by side| Feature | Mercury 2 | MiniMax M3 |
|---|---|---|
| Vision | — | ✓ |
| Tool use | ✓ | ✓ |
| Reasoning | — | ✓ |
| Audio | — | — |
| Prompt caching | ✓ | ✓ |
| Structured output | ✓ | ✓ |
| Web search | — | — |
Related comparisons
Frequently asked questions
Which is cheaper, Mercury 2 or MiniMax M3?
MiniMax M3 is cheaper for input ($0.25 vs $0.23 per 1M tokens) from Wandb. Mercury 2 is cheaper for output ($0.75 vs $0.96 per 1M tokens) from Inception.
What is the context window difference between Mercury 2 and MiniMax M3?
Mercury 2 has a 128K-token context window and MiniMax M3 has 1M tokens, so MiniMax M3 can take a larger prompt.
How do Mercury 2 and MiniMax M3 compare on benchmarks?
On the tracked benchmarks, MiniMax M3 leads on Terminal-Bench, and MiniMax M3 leads on intelligence.
Listed prices from LiteLLM, OpenRouter and Vercel · last checked Oct 14, 2026
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