Mistral releases Mistral Large 4, a free AI model anyone can download

French AI company Mistral has released Mistral Large 4, nicknamed "Le Chonk," and announced Thursday that it is available for download. It first appeared in public preview earlier this month. Mistral says it is one of the best open models in the world. That claim comes from the company, not from an outside test.

What it is

Mistral Large 4 is the company's new top model. It handles both text and images, which closes gaps in earlier Mistral models. It was also trained on more than 160 languages, including every official language of the European Union.

The model is "open-weight." That means the trained model itself is published, so developers and companies can download it and adapt it, instead of only renting access from a closed provider.

What Mistral says it does well

• Defensive cybersecurity, such as checking logs, auditing code and looking for newly published security flaws
• Agentic work, meaning an AI that carries out multi-step tasks like planning and research
• Manufacturing and finance-related tasks
• Analyzing aerial and satellite images, such as spotting forest fires on maps

Mistral says the model reaches top performance on two tests of how well AI agents handle complex jobs, SWE-bench and Terminal Bench. It also says the model beats all existing models, including closed ones, on grounding. Grounding ties an AI's answers to documents and databases, which helps cut down on made-up answers.

How to try it

There are several ways in. Mistral says the model can be used in Mistral Studio, through the Mistral API, or on OpenRouter. The open weights can be downloaded from Hugging Face. It is also available in Vibe Code and through Nvidia-hosted endpoints. Enterprise users get extra options to customize it.

What is not clear yet

The material does not give pricing, the computer hardware needed to run the model yourself, or the exact terms for using it in a business. Those details matter for any company deciding whether to switch.

Mistral also says the model outperforms European and US models and is catching up to Chinese rivals, who have led the open-weight field. Those comparisons are Mistral's own, so independent testing will show how they hold up.

Who it affects

Most people will not download a model like this. The news matters most for businesses and developers who want a top-tier AI they can customize, rather than depending on one closed provider. It also adds to a fast run of new models, following recent launches from Meta and Google.