# Mistral SDK
The Mistral SDK is the official client library for [[Mistral AI]]'s API platform, La Plateforme. Sits at the *model SDK* layer of [[AI SDKs]], peer to [[Anthropic SDK]] and [[OpenAI SDK]]. Officially supported in **Python** (`mistralai`) and **TypeScript / JavaScript** (`@mistralai/mistralai`), with a Go and TypeScript implementations also available.
It is also OpenAI-API-compatible at the chat completions layer, so the [[OpenAI SDK]] can talk to Mistral's endpoints with a custom `base_url` if you want a single dependency across providers.
## API Surfaces
- **Chat Completions** ; standard prompt/response, tool use, streaming
- **Embeddings** ; `mistral-embed`
- **Code completion** ; Codestral models
- **Vision** ; Pixtral models
- **OCR** ; Mistral OCR for document understanding
- **Function calling** ; structured tool definitions
- **JSON mode / structured outputs**
- **Fine-tuning** ; via API
- **Agents API** ; Mistral's own agent runtime layer (newer)
## Python Example
```python
from mistralai import Mistral
client = Mistral(api_key=os.environ["MISTRAL_API_KEY"])
response = client.chat.complete(
model="mistral-large-latest",
messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Why pick Mistral?"}],
)
```
## TypeScript Example
```ts
import { Mistral } from "@mistralai/mistralai";
const client = new Mistral({ apiKey: process.env.MISTRAL_API_KEY });
const result = await client.chat.complete({
model: "mistral-large-latest",
messages: [{ role: "user", content: "Why pick Mistral?" }],
});
```
## Why You'd Reach For It
- **Open-weight models with optional managed hosting** ; Mistral 7B, 8x7B, Mistral Small/Medium/Large, Codestral, Pixtral, Mistral OCR. La Plateforme hosts the closed Large/Medium tier; the smaller models are downloadable
- **EU residency** ; Mistral runs on EU infrastructure; meaningful for GDPR-strict deployments
- **Specialized models** ; Codestral for code, Pixtral for vision, OCR for document workflows ; one provider covers several niches
- **Strong cost / quality trade-off** for the medium tier
## Where It Fits
- **Direct Mistral API access** → Mistral SDK
- **Mistral as one of many providers behind one abstraction** → [[Vercel AI SDK]] with `@ai-sdk/mistral`, or [[LiteLLM]] in Python
- **Self-hosted Mistral via Ollama / vLLM** → use those tools' clients (often OpenAI-API-compatible)
- **Mistral via [[Groq]]** ; Groq hosts open Mistral variants on LPU silicon for very fast inference
## License
Apache-2.0 on the SDK. Mistral's models have varying licenses (Apache-2.0 for many open-weight ones; commercial licenses for Large/Medium).
## References
- Python SDK: https://github.com/mistralai/client-python
- TypeScript SDK: https://github.com/mistralai/client-ts
- Documentation: https://docs.mistral.ai/
## Related
- [[Mistral AI]]
- [[Anthropic SDK]]
- [[OpenAI SDK]]
- [[AI SDKs]]
- [[Vercel AI SDK]]
- [[LiteLLM]]
- [[Groq]]