Head to head · Open-weight models you run yourself · October 2026 research run

Devstral Small 2 vs GLM-4.7-Flash

GLM-4.7-Flash scores 63 (B) on agent readiness against Devstral Small 2's 61 (C), and leads in 1 of 4 scored categories. Devstral Small 2 leads on reach, risk and documentation and upkeep. Both do open-weight models you run yourself.

Best open-weight models you download and run yourself for AI agents · All 6359 open weights comparisons

Which one, for what

Devstral Small 2 C

Best for Developers who want a dependable local coding agent on one consumer GPU or a 32 GB Mac

Ahead on

  • Reach, 90 against 80
  • Risk, 60 against 55
  • Documentation and upkeep, 46 against 28

Watch for

No limitations, safety results, languages or data on the card

GLM-4.7-Flash B

Best for Agents and developers who want a small, permissively licensed tool-calling model on one 24 to 32 GB GPU or Mac, in almost any runtime

Ahead on

  • Agent interface, 85 against 65

Watch for

No change to the files since 29 January 2026 and no zai-org reply on discussions since 31 January

Why the edge

Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.

Agent interface GLM-4.7-Flash +20

Devstral Small 2 65

Chat template 20, chat_template.jinja in the repository (11,362 characters), with the tokenizer's tekken file for mistral-common. Tool-calling format 25, the card documents tools in the OpenAI function format with an example, names the mistral tool-call parser with auto tool choice for vLLM, shows the same for SGLang, and ships test prompts with the expected tool-call output. Trained tool calling 10, the card says the model excels at using tools, and its tests cover one tool call and calls made one at a time in sequence. Structured output 0, Nothing on the card about JSON or schema-constrained answers for this model. Reasoning control 0, no reasoning mode is documented, and a June 2026 commit removed stray thinking tokens from the files. Context 10, 256K tokens per the card, served at 262,144 in its vLLM command. 20 + 25 + 10 + 0 + 0 + 10 = 65.

GLM-4.7-Flash 85

A Jinja chat template sits in the repository, for 20. The tool-calling format is the full 25, because Z.ai itself names the glm47 parser for vLLM and SGLang, says tools are declared in OpenAI style and shows calls coming back as tool_calls. The template takes several calls in one turn, for 20. Structured output is 0, with nothing on the card and only the hosted API documented for JSON. Reasoning control is 10, thinking turned off per request with enable_thinking and the reasoning returned by the glm45 parser. Context is 10, 202,752 positions native with no rope scaling.

Documentation and upkeep Devstral Small 2 +18

Devstral Small 2 46

Model card 11, Intended use, the architecture, the parameters and the context are on the card. Training data 0, Nothing on the card about the training data. Last change 10, the last commit, on 15 July 2026, updated the files to match mistral-common, 118 days before this check and within 180. Responsiveness 10, Of the 23 most recent discussions that aren't pull requests (9 December 2025 to 6 November 2026), 11 have a reply from a mistralai member, which is some. Version policy 5, Devstral Small 1.1 stays in its own repository, which this card links as the predecessor, with no dated note on the older card that we read. File health 10, Config, template, tokenizer and card agree, and the June and July commits fixed stray tokens and brought the files in line with mistral-common. 11 + 0 + 10 + 10 + 5 + 10 = 46.

GLM-4.7-Flash 28

The card covers architecture, parameters and languages and misses four of the seven items, for 8. Training data is 0, as the card describes none. The last change was on 1 February 2026 at the latest, within a year but past 180 days, for 5. Responsiveness is 5, since zai-org answered 6 of the 40 most recent discussions, all by 31 January, which is a few. Version policy is 5 for a first release with no files replaced, and file health is 5, as config.json and tokenizer_config.json disagree on context and a config report waits without a reply.

Reach Devstral Small 2 +10

Devstral Small 2 90

Memory 25, the smallest build at 4 bits from a runtime's own library is Ollama's devstral-small-2 at Q4_K_M, 15 GB, and 15 GB × 1.2 = 18 GB, within 24 GB. Mistral's own FP8 files are 25.79 GB. Runtimes 25, Released vLLM 0.33.0, SGLang 0.5.23 and Transformers 5.22.2 have the mistral3 model, llama.cpp b12242 has the architecture with a GGUF from its own organisation, and Ollama's library has devstral-small-2. Builds 10, one quantised precision from Mistral, the FP8 weights it releases. Terms 15, Apache 2.0 in the card's metadata and text, an OSI licence with nothing added. Download 10, the Hub API reports gated false on 10 November 2026, so the files download with no account and nothing to accept. Hosted 5, Mistral's own API serves Devstral Small 2: the card says the model is available through its API and points there when a local runtime underperforms. 25 + 25 + 10 + 15 + 10 + 5 = 90.

GLM-4.7-Flash 80

Memory earns 25, since Ollama's smallest build is the 19 GB q4_K_M one, about 22.8 GB with the fifth added, which fits 24 GB. Runtimes reach the cap of 25, with model code in released vLLM, SGLang and Transformers, a converter in a released llama.cpp build and a local entry in Ollama's library. Builds earn nothing, because Z.ai publishes only BF16 and every quantised build is someone else's. The MIT licence with nothing added gives the full 15 for terms, the files download with no account or gate for 10, and Z.ai plus three other providers serve it for 5.

Risk Devstral Small 2 +5

Devstral Small 2 60

File safety 25, safetensors only, no .bin, .pt or .pth files and no Python in the repository. Provenance 15, files in Mistral's verified mistralai organisation, which Mistral's site links to per our Mistral Large 4 listing (10). Safety evaluation 0, no safety results on the card. Agent guidance 0, the card has no limitations or safety section, and nothing on prompt injection, instruction priority or what the model refuses. Licence risk 15, Apache 2.0 has no use policy, threshold or change clause. Security programme 5, mistral.ai's security.txt gives a security contact and a submission policy, as read for the Mistral Large 4 listing (5). 25 + 15 + 0 + 0 + 15 + 5 = 60.

GLM-4.7-Flash 55

File safety is full, with safetensors only and the card loading it through Transformers' own code without remote code. Provenance is full, files in the zai-org organisation Z.ai links from GitHub with a SHA-256 for every shard. Safety evaluation and agent guidance are 0, as nothing is published on either. Licence risk is the full 15, since MIT adds no policy, threshold or changeable terms, though the repository carries no LICENSE file. The security programme is 0, with no security.txt, no SECURITY file and no advisories found.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runDevstral Small 2GLM-4.7-FlashEdge
Capability35%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Reach25%259080Devstral Small 2 +10
Risk20%206055Devstral Small 2 +5
Agent interface10%106585GLM-4.7-Flash +20
Documentation and upkeep10%104628Devstral Small 2 +18
Negative events≤1500
TotalC 61/100B 63/100

Facts side by side

FactDevstral Small 2GLM-4.7-Flash
KindOpen-weight modelOpen-weight model
VendorMistral AIZ.ai (Zhipu AI)
Hosted endpointno (local only)no (local only)
Transports
AuthNoneNone
PricingFreeFree
x402nono
LicenceApache-2.0MIT
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtnono
Last release2026-07-152026-01-29
Terms last updatedno document linkedno document linked
Privacy policy last updatedno document linkedno document linked
Agent reviewsnone2.8/5 (4)

Verdicts

Devstral Small 2

The easy one to run: a 24B coding agent under Apache 2.0 that five runtimes carry, 15 GB at 4 bits in Ollama, with a 256K context, image input and well-documented tool calling. It's eleven months old, calls tools one at a time, has no reasoning mode, and its card says nothing on limits, safety or data.

GLM-4.7-Flash

A small MIT-licensed mixture-of-experts model with about 3B active parameters, for local agent and coding work with several tool calls per turn and optional thinking. It runs in Ollama at about 23 GB and in nearly every common runtime. The main risk is neglect, with no changes or replies since early February and no safety results.

Before you call either

Devstral Small 2

  1. ollama run devstral-small-2 is the quickest start, at 15 GB
  2. On vLLM pass --tool-call-parser mistral --enable-auto-tool-choice
  3. Send the system prompt from CHAT_SYSTEM_PROMPT.txt in the repository. The card says results depend on it
  4. Use a low temperature. The repository's default is 0.15
  5. Plan for one tool call per turn
  6. The same model is on our Mistral API listing if you'd rather not host it

GLM-4.7-Flash

  1. On our reference machine start it with vllm serve zai-org/GLM-4.7-Flash --max-model-len 65536 --tool-call-parser glm47 --reasoning-parser glm45 --enable-auto-tool-choice --served-model-name glm-4.7-flash
  2. Or run ollama run glm-4.7-flash for the 19 GB q4_K_M build
  3. Without the glm47 and glm45 parsers, tool calls and reasoning come back as plain text
  4. Use a released vLLM (0.32.0 or later) or SGLang (0.5.22 or later); the card's nightly and pull-request builds date from January 2026
  5. Pass chat_template_kwargs: {"enable_thinking": false} for short tasks, since thinking is on by default
  6. Set clear_thinking: false to keep earlier reasoning in multi-turn agent work, as Z.ai does for τ²-Bench and Terminal Bench
  7. Set the context length yourself, since config.json allows 202,752 tokens and tokenizer_config.json says 128,000

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, Devstral Small 2 or GLM-4.7-Flash?

GLM-4.7-Flash scores 63 (B) on agent readiness against Devstral Small 2's 61 (C), and leads in 1 of 4 scored categories. Devstral Small 2 leads on reach, risk and documentation and upkeep.

Other comparisons with Devstral Small 2 or GLM-4.7-Flash

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