Mercury 2 vs Llama 4 Maverick
Updated October 21, 2026. 37 benchmarks have a result for both. Coding is ranked on the Vibe Coding Index; every other board is shown as published.
Decision reading
Pick Llama 4 Maverick for coding: it scores 18.1 on the Vibe Coding Index against 0.0 for Mercury 2.
Pick Mercury 2 when what matters is AA Coding Index or SciCode, where it leads.
- Shared results
- 37
- Mercury 2 only
- 5
- Llama 4 Maverick only
- 47
- Like-for-like categories
- 7 of 9
Shared results can support a head-to-head reading. Results only one model has describe coverage, not superiority.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, four public coding benchmarks
Llama 4 Maverick
Llama 4 Maverick scores 18.1 against 0.0.
1 and 2 benchmarks behind the scores
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
Mercury 2
Mercury 2 leads, 10.8 against 9.3.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
Mercury 2
Mercury 2 leads, 1.6 against 0.6.
Same board, both measured
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only Llama 4 Maverick has a GPQA Diamond result, 69.4%.
Directional only
Math
AIME
No call
Only Llama 4 Maverick has a AIME result, 25.2%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only Llama 4 Maverick has a MMLU Pro result, 79.4%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
Mercury 2
Mercury 2 leads, 1036 against 871.
Same board, both measured
Long documents
Listed context window
Llama 4 Maverick
Llama 4 Maverick takes 524K tokens against 128K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Llama 4 Maverick
Mercury 2 $0.0006, Llama 4 Maverick $0.0005 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
No call
Only Llama 4 Maverick has the number, $1.491.
Directional only
At a glance
- Coding index
- Mercury 2 0.0 from 1 benchmark, Llama 4 Maverick 18.1 from 2 benchmarks.
- Widest category
- Agentic work, 27.0 points apart on average over 2 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- τ²-Bench Telecom: Mercury 2 70.8% against Llama 4 Maverick 17.8%, 52.9 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Mercury 2 $0.75 against Llama 4 Maverick $0.6525 per million output tokens, 1.1x apart.
- Context window
- Mercury 2 takes 128K tokens, Llama 4 Maverick 524K.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | Mercury 2 | Bars | Llama 4 Maverick | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 7 | 0 | ||
| Intelligence | 1 | 0 | ||
| Agentic work | 2 | 0 | ||
| Reasoning | 5 | 0 | ||
| Knowledge | 3 | 0 | ||
| Web design | 6 | 0 | ||
| General | 12 | 1 | ||
| All shared boards | 36 | 1 |
CodingLike-for-likeFour of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index70
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aider polyglot | Not measured | 15.6% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| SWE-bench Verified | Not measured | 21.0% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1171 | Not measured | Only Mercury 2 measured |
| AA Coding Index | 31.1 | 16.3 | Mercury 2 |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 47.3% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 39.7% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| SciCode | 37.7% | 31.7% | Mercury 2 |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | 26.5% | 6.8% | Mercury 2 |
| WeirdML | 43.2% | 24.5% | Mercury 2 |
| ALE-Bench | 785.6 | 173.0 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1390 | 1301 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1385 | 1299 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1160 | Not measured | Only Mercury 2 measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1199 | Not measured | Only Mercury 2 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 24 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index10
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 10.8 | 9.3 | Mercury 2 |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | Not measured | 132.2 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
Agentic workLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index20
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | 1.6 | 0.6 | Mercury 2 |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | 70.8% | 17.8% | Mercury 2 |
| Neither model has a result on the other 37 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index50
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | Not measured | 69.4% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | Not measured | 71.7% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 77.0% | 67.1% | Mercury 2 |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 17.1% | 4.9% | Mercury 2 |
| ARC-AGI | Not measured | 4.4% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | Not measured | 0.0% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| SimpleBench | Not measured | 27.7% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1362 | 1281 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1358 | 1259 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1374 | 1295 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Vision: diagrams | Not measured | 1134 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Vision: homework | Not measured | 1164 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 9 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index7 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | Not measured | 25.2% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MATH 500 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 85.2% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MGSM (Vals AI) | Not measured | 92.4% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| AA Math Index | Not measured | 19.3 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 19.3% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: math | Not measured | 1299 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | Not measured | 1295 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 6 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index30
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | Not measured | 79.4% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 77.8% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | Not measured | 49.7% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | Not measured | 66.6% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | Not measured | 58.5% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | Not measured | 43.3% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | Not measured | 36.5% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 80.9% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| GeoBench | Not measured | 52.0% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1343 | 1288 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1363 | 1275 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | Not measured | 1286 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1349 | 1260 | Mercury 2 |
| Neither model has a result on the other 4 boards here | |||
Web designLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index60
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1036 | 871 | Mercury 2 |
| Design Arena: UI components | 998 | 899 | Mercury 2 |
| Design Arena: game dev | 985 | 838 | Mercury 2 |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1009 | 882 | Mercury 2 |
| Design Arena: 3D | 982 | 901 | Mercury 2 |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1022 | 880 | Mercury 2 |
| Design Arena: SVG | 998 | Not measured | Only Mercury 2 measured |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | 990 | Not measured | Only Mercury 2 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 1 board here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index121
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SAGE (Vals AI) | Not measured | 35.7% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | Not measured | 54.2% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| IFBench | 69.8% | 43.0% | Mercury 2 |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 43.7% | 50.0% | Llama 4 Maverick |
| DTBench | Not measured | 61.9% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMCA | Not measured | 15.9% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| Fiction.LiveBench | Not measured | 46.2% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| Creative writing (Lech Mazur) | Not measured | 62.0% | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text | 1354 | 1287 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1328 | 1267 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1286 | 1266 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Vision | Not measured | 1142 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: English | 1378 | 1303 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1330 | 1269 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1414 | 1277 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: German | Not measured | 1291 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | Not measured | 1206 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | Not measured | 1203 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: French | Not measured | 1259 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | Not measured | 1293 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1304 | 1286 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: Polish | Not measured | 1275 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1357 | 1289 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1329 | 1280 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1300 | 1277 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1314 | 1250 | Mercury 2 |
| LMArena Vision: English | Not measured | 1150 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Vision: Chinese | Not measured | 1141 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Vision: reading text | Not measured | 1143 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Vision: humor | Not measured | 1100 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| LMArena Vision: creative writing | Not measured | 1099 | Only Llama 4 Maverick measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 15 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Mercury 2 | Llama 4 Maverick | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
Llama 4 Maverick costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Llama 4 Maverick costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Llama 4 Maverick costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | Inception Mercury 2 | Meta Llama 4 Maverick |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Inception | Meta Llama |
| Weights | No public weights listed | Open weights |
| Released | March 4, 2026 | April 5, 2025 |
| Context window | 128K | 524K |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.25 | $0.1875 |
| Output $/Mtok | $0.75 | $0.6525 |
| Coding index | 0.0 | 18.1 |
| Independent measurements behind it | 1 | 2 |
| Cost per solved task | Not computable | $1.491 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Mercury 2 better than Llama 4 Maverick for coding?
Pick Llama 4 Maverick for coding: it scores 18.1 on the Vibe Coding Index against 0.0 for Mercury 2. Pick Mercury 2 when what matters is AA Coding Index or SciCode, where it leads.
Which is cheaper, Mercury 2 or Llama 4 Maverick?
Mercury 2 costs $0.25 per million input tokens and $0.75 per million output tokens; Llama 4 Maverick costs $0.1875 and $0.6525. Cost per solved task is known for Llama 4 Maverick only.
Which has the bigger context window, Mercury 2 or Llama 4 Maverick?
Llama 4 Maverick, with 524K tokens against 128K.
How many benchmarks is the Mercury 2 vs Llama 4 Maverick comparison based on?
37 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 21, 2026. Mercury 2's coding index rests on 1 independent benchmark and Llama 4 Maverick's on 2. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.