Model comparison

GPT-5.6 Sol vs Inkling-Small

GPT-5.6 Sol is the stronger model overall, scoring 65.0 to 46.5 on the Noometry Index. Inkling-Small costs 13× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GPT-5.6 Sol's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 33 shared benchmarks.

GPT-5.6 Sol OpenAI

65.0

Rank #7 Confirmed

Inkling-Small Thinking Machines Lab

46.5

Rank #63 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 33 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-5.6 Sol scores higher in 9 categories and Inkling-Small in 0 categories; 9 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where GPT-5.6 Sol leads 85.6 to 45.1.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is ProofBench: 83% for GPT-5.6 Sol and 6% for Inkling-Small.
  • Inkling-Small is cheaper at $0.45 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $4 / $20 for GPT-5.6 Sol.
  • GPT-5.6 Sol accepts more context: 1.05M tokens versus 524K.
  • Inkling-Small has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GPT-5.6 Sol and Inkling-Small specifications
GPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
ProviderOpenAIThinking Machines Lab
Noometry Index65.046.5
Released2026-07-092026-07-15
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1.05M524K
Max output128K1.05M
Input $ / M tokens$4$0.45
Output $ / M tokens$20$1.20
Results tracked6533

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Category by category

Coding GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 65.1 (#7), Inkling-Small: 43.6 (#85)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
LMArena WebDev16181409
SciCode57.1%48.7%
LMArena Coding14981451
DeepSWE72.7%—
FrontierCode47.5%—
CursorBench41.7%—
FrontierSWE32.2%—
GSO76.5%—
WeirdML89.4%—
MirrorCode20%—
ALE-Bench2,177—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

GPT-5.6 Sol: 50.3 (#7), Inkling-Small: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
APEX-Agents51.4%—
OSWorld 2.027.3%—
τ²-bench Banking46.9%—
PostTrainBench36.2%—
BALROG60%—
GBAEval52.6%—
GDP.pdf30.7%—
LMArena Search1257—
Vending-Bench 29,619—

Reasoning GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 74.8 (#8), Inkling-Small: 38.6 (#63)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
ARC-AGI-292.5%40.1%
ARC-AGI-197.5%84%
CritPt32.3%8.3%
Chess Puzzles64%18%
LMArena Hard Prompts14841423
Mystery Game Puzzles58%6%
Epoch Capabilities Index161.66150.15
SimpleBench71.7%—
Kagi LLM Benchmark67%—
NYT Connections (extended)93.8%—
EnigmaEval37.1%—
EBR-Bench44.8%—
DTBench96%—
LMCA59.2%—
Surface Evolver Bench93.1%—
Bench to the Future 30.14—

Math GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 85.6 (#9), Inkling-Small: 45.1 (#77)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)89.1%46.3%
FrontierMath Tier 482.9%17.1%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025100%90%
ProofBench83%6%
LMArena Math14741459
FrontierMath Erdős0%—

Knowledge GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 64.3 (#18), Inkling-Small: 48.2 (#77)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
GPQA Diamond93.5%88.5%
SimpleQA Verified69.7%19.1%
LMArena Expert15161442
Vectara Hallucination Rate12.4%—

Multimodal GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 48.6 (#9), Inkling-Small: 39.1 (#62)

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
LMArena Vision12811235
Blueprint-Bench 233.6%—
Furniture Assembly56.7%—
LMArena Document1483—

Multilingual GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 55.3 (#32), Inkling-Small: 51.7 (#104)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
LMArena Non-English14521402
LMArena Chinese15271465
LMArena French14771436
LMArena German14761405
LMArena Japanese14711405
LMArena Korean14421363
LMArena Russian14681391
LMArena Spanish14411428

Instruction Following GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 77.7 (#16), Inkling-Small: 73.8 (#114)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
LMArena Instruction Following14821399

Long Context GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 45.4 (#42), Inkling-Small: 42.7 (#118)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
LMArena Longer Query14801401

Writing & Preference GPT-5.6 Sol leads

GPT-5.6 Sol: 73.3 (#12), Inkling-Small: 59.6 (#107)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5.6 SolInkling-Small
LMArena Text14571414
LMArena Creative Writing14481331
EQ-Bench Creative Writing19721491
LMArena Multi-Turn14601418
EQ-Bench 41250—

Frequently asked questions

Is GPT-5.6 Sol better than Inkling-Small?

GPT-5.6 Sol is the stronger model overall, scoring 65.0 to 46.5 on the Noometry Index. Inkling-Small costs 13× less per token, which makes it the better buy when GPT-5.6 Sol's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, GPT-5.6 Sol or Inkling-Small?

Inkling-Small is cheaper. It lists at $0.45 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; GPT-5.6 Sol lists at $4 and $20.

Is GPT-5.6 Sol or Inkling-Small better for coding?

GPT-5.6 Sol scores higher on coding benchmarks: 65.1 versus 43.6 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

GPT-5.6 Sol does, with 1.05M tokens against 524K.

How many benchmarks do GPT-5.6 Sol and Inkling-Small share?

33 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-5.6 Sol has 65 scored results on Noometry and Inkling-Small has 33.

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