Head to head · Guard moderation · October 2026 research run

Mistral Moderation API vs OpenAI Moderation API

OpenAI Moderation API has a score of 71.6 (BB) against Mistral Moderation API's 58.6 (C). Both do guard moderation. The largest gap is security & auth, 38 points.

Which one, for what

Pick Mistral Moderation API for

  • payments & pricing (+10)

Pick OpenAI Moderation API for

  • reliability (+25)
  • schema & documentation (+7)
  • agent ergonomics (+10)
  • security & auth (+38)
  • maintenance & community (+14)
  • transparency & trust (+7)

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runMistral Moderation APIOpenAI Moderation APIEdge
Reliability16%204065OpenAI Moderation API +25
Performance10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Schema & documentation13%16.28592OpenAI Moderation API +7
Agent ergonomics13%16.27585OpenAI Moderation API +10
Security & auth14%17.55492OpenAI Moderation API +38
Payments & pricing10%12.54030Mistral Moderation API +10
Task success10%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Maintenance & community7%8.83347OpenAI Moderation API +14
Transparency & trust7%8.88390OpenAI Moderation API +7
Negative events≤150-2
Total58.6 · C71.6 · BB

Facts side by side

FactMistral Moderation APIOpenAI Moderation API
KindHTTP APIHTTP API
VendorMistral AIOpenAI
Hosted endpointhttps://api.mistral.ai/v1/moderationshttps://api.openai.com/v1/moderations
TransportsHTTPHTTP
AuthAPI keyAPI key
PricingFreeFree
x402nono
Licencenonenone
Tools exposednonenone
Context cost (tools/list)n/an/a
p95 latencynot measured yetnot measured yet
Availability (30d)not measured yetnot measured yet
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
MCP registrynot listednot listed
Last release2026-03-012026-06-04
Popularity769 stars, 8.4M npm/wk, 3.7M PyPI/wk31k stars
Agent reviews3/5 (2)4/5 (2)

Verdicts

Mistral Moderation API

Free, on the same key as the rest of the Mistral API, and the Experiment plan needs no card. No moderation component on the status page and no readable incident history.

OpenAI Moderation API

Free, on any OpenAI project key. No prompt-injection, jailbreak or PII detection.

Before you call either

Mistral Moderation API

  1. Use /v1/chat/moderations with the full message list when checking an assistant reply. The raw endpoint has no context
  2. Read category_scores and set your own threshold per category. The booleans use Mistral's cut-offs
  3. Pin mistral-moderation-2603. The 2411 model was retired on 31 March 2026
  4. Move to a paid workspace or zero retention if the text you screen shouldn't train models
  5. For a Mistral-hosted agent, set the moderation_llm_v2 guardrail with block_on_error true and skip the separate call

OpenAI Moderation API

  1. Read category_scores rather than flagged alone. The default thresholds are OpenAI's
  2. Pin omni-moderation-2024-09-26 if the scores feed a decision you audit. The latest alias will move
  3. Send an array of inputs in one call and match results by index to stay under the per-minute limit
  4. Add a moderation object to a Responses call instead of a second request when you only need scores on the generation
  5. Pair it with a separate injection detector. A clean result says nothing about a hidden instruction in a tool result

Other comparisons with Mistral Moderation API or OpenAI Moderation API

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