Mistral AI is an artificial intelligence company based in France. It develops language models and makes them available to developers and companies, both via API and, in some cases, with open weights for download.

It is important to separate the company from the models. The company is Mistral AI. The models have their own names, and the term Mistral, on its own, can refer to any of them.

How it works

Mistral trains models and makes them available in two main ways.

In the first, you access the model via API. You send the text, receive the response and pay for usage, according to the conditions published by the company.

In the second, some models are released with open weights. This allows you to download the model and run it on your own infrastructure, respecting the license for each one. The license changes from model to model, so it is worth reading before using it in a product.

Practical example

A Brazilian customer service company wants an assistant that answers customer questions. The technology team can test a Mistral model via API to validate the idea quickly.

If later there is a requirement to keep data within its own infrastructure, the team can evaluate an open weights model running on its own server.

Terminal
curl https://api.mistral.ai/v1/chat/completions \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $MISTRAL_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"model":"NOME_DO_MODELO","messages":[{"role":"user","content":"Olá"}]}'

Replace MODEL_NAME with a model listed in the official documentation.

What it is used for

Mistral models are used for text generation, summarization, translation, classification, conversational assistants and programming support.

For those building products, having more than one provider is a way to reduce dependency and compare cost and quality. On platforms like bridgecode, you can have models from different providers working in the same flow.

How to follow news

The company releases models frequently. To know names, versions, limits and current conditions, always consult the official Mistral website and documentation, and not old third party lists.

Difference between Mistral AI and Mistral

Mistral AI is the company. Mistral, in conversations about models, is usually the family of models created by it. When citing in a project, prefer the exact model name and version, because behavior changes between them.