API cost decision in 10 seconds

Mercury 2 vs INTELLECT-3

Pick Mercury 2 for lower cost; pick INTELLECT-3 only if the larger context window matters more.

Page updated: 2026-05-26T10:03:26Z Data confirmed: 2026-05-26T12:38:15Z Prices normalized to USD per 1M tokens Sample workload: 1M input + 500K output

Budget verdict

Pick Mercury 2 for lower cost; pick INTELLECT-3 only if the larger context window matters more.

On the standard 1M input plus 500K output workload, Mercury 2 is estimated at $0.62 vs $0.75 for INTELLECT-3, saving $0.12 (16.7% lower).

Cost-first pickMercury 2

Context-first pickINTELLECT-3

Sample savings$0.1216.7%

10x traffic gap$1.25

INTELLECT-3 has more context, but Mercury 2 saves $0.12 on the standard workload. At 10x that traffic, the same price gap is about $1.25. Use the calculator below to replace the sample workload with your own token volume.

Cost sensitivity

Workload Sensitivity

Same prices, different token mixes.

Cost winner changes by workload shape: input-heavy / RAG favors INTELLECT-3, balanced workload favors Mercury 2, and output-heavy chatbot favors Mercury 2.

Workload shape	Token mix	Better pick	Mercury 2	INTELLECT-3
Input-heavy / RAG	5M input + 500K output	INTELLECT-3	$1.62	$1.55
Balanced workload	1M input + 1M output	Mercury 2	$1	$1.3
Output-heavy chatbot	1M input + 5M output	Mercury 2	$4	$5.7

Cheaper input INTELLECT-3 $0.25 vs $0.2 / 1M

INTELLECT-3 is $0.05 cheaper per 1M input tokens (20% lower; 1.25x difference).

Cheaper output Mercury 2 $0.75 vs $1.1 / 1M

Mercury 2 is $0.35 cheaper per 1M output tokens (31.8% lower; 1.47x difference).

Larger context INTELLECT-3 128K vs 131.07K

INTELLECT-3 has 3.07K more context (1.02x larger).

Sample workload Mercury 2 $0.62 vs $0.75

Mercury 2 is $0.12 cheaper on the standard workload (16.7% lower).

Estimate your workload cost

Your Workload Cost

Prices are normalized to USD per 1M tokens.

Monthly input tokens Monthly output tokens

Mercury 2 Calculating… Estimated API cost

INTELLECT-3 Calculating… Estimated API cost

Cheaper for this workload Calculating… Difference: calculating…

This estimate uses normalized public API pricing per 1M tokens. It is a planning aid, not a billing quote. Verify provider pricing, limits, and terms before production use.

Quick Decision

Verdict

INTELLECT-3 has the lower input price; Mercury 2 has the lower output price; INTELLECT-3 offers the larger context window. For the 1M input plus 500K output sample, Mercury 2 is cheaper for the standard workload.

For a 1M input token plus 500K output token workload, the estimated API cost is $0.62 for Mercury 2 and $0.75 for INTELLECT-3.

Best Fit

Choose Mercury 2 when you care most about lower output-token price.

Choose INTELLECT-3 when you care most about lower input-token price, and larger context window.

Decision Notes

On the standard 1M input plus 500K output workload, Mercury 2 is estimated at $0.62 vs $0.75 for INTELLECT-3, saving $0.12 (16.7% lower).
Mercury 2 is $0.12 cheaper on the standard workload (16.7% lower).
INTELLECT-3 is $0.05 cheaper per 1M input tokens (20% lower; 1.25x difference).
Mercury 2 is $0.35 cheaper per 1M output tokens (31.8% lower; 1.47x difference).
INTELLECT-3 has 3.07K more context (1.02x larger).

Head-to-Head Specs

Feature	Mercury 2 (Inception)	INTELLECT-3 (Prime Intellect)
Input Price prompt tokens per 1M	$0.25	$0.2
Completion Price per 1M tokens	$0.75	$1.1
Sample Workload Cost 1M input + 500K output	$0.62	$0.75
Context Window	128K	131.07K
Release Date	2026-03-04	2025-11-27

Use-Case Decision Matrix

Use case	Better pick	Why
Budget-constrained production	Mercury 2	On the standard 1M input plus 500K output workload, Mercury 2 is estimated at $0.62 vs $0.75 for INTELLECT-3, saving $0.12 (16.7% lower).
High-volume input processing	INTELLECT-3	Lower prompt-token price matters most when prompts, retrieved passages, or documents dominate the bill.
Long responses and chatbots	Mercury 2	Lower output-token price matters most when assistants generate many completion tokens.
RAG or long-document work	INTELLECT-3	A larger context window leaves more room for retrieved passages, conversation history, or source files.

Related Alternatives

Same-provider lower-cost swaps

No lower-cost same-provider swap is currently tracked for this pair.

Larger context near this budget

Llama 4 Scout offers 10M context with $0.23 sample workload cost.
Owl Alpha offers 1.05M context with $0 sample workload cost.
DeepSeek V4 Flash offers 1.05M context with $0.2 sample workload cost.
DeepSeek V4 Pro offers 1.05M context with $0.87 sample workload cost.

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Cheaper alternatives

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Larger context alternatives

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Provider catalogs

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Inception catalog

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Prime Intellect catalog

Check other Prime Intellect models with comparable pricing, context, or release timing.

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Mercury 2

Mercury 2 is an extremely fast reasoning LLM, and the first reasoning diffusion LLM (dLLM). Instead of generating tokens sequentially, Mercury 2 produces and refines multiple tokens in parallel, achieving...

INTELLECT-3

INTELLECT-3 is a 106B-parameter Mixture-of-Experts model (12B active) post-trained from GLM-4.5-Air-Base using supervised fine-tuning (SFT) followed by large-scale reinforcement learning (RL). It offers state-of-the-art performance for its size across math,...