Model comparison

GPT-5 Mini vs Inkling-Small

Inkling-Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.5 to 41.8 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 32 shared benchmarks.

GPT-5 Mini OpenAI

41.8

Rank #128 Confirmed

Inkling-Small Thinking Machines Lab

46.5

Rank #63 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 32 benchmarks with published results for both. GPT-5 Mini scores higher in 2 categories and Inkling-Small in 7 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Inkling-Small leads 38.6 to 23.9.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is ARC-AGI-2: 4.4% for GPT-5 Mini and 40.1% for Inkling-Small.
  • Inkling-Small is cheaper at $0.45 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $0.25 / $2 for GPT-5 Mini.
  • Inkling-Small accepts more context: 524K tokens versus 400K.
  • Inkling-Small has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

GPT-5 Mini and Inkling-Small specifications
GPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
ProviderOpenAIThinking Machines Lab
Noometry Index41.846.5
Released2025-08-072026-07-15
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window400K524K
Max output128K1.05M
Input $ / M tokens$0.25$0.45
Output $ / M tokens$2$1.20
Results tracked6033

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Category by category

Coding Inkling-Small leads

GPT-5 Mini: 40.1 (#146), Inkling-Small: 43.6 (#85)

Coding benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
SciCode39.2%48.7%
LMArena Coding14061451
SWE-bench Verified64.7%—
SWE-bench Verified (bash only)59.8%—
LMArena WebDev—1409
SWE-bench Multilingual39.7%—
WeirdML52.7%—
ALE-Bench799.77—
AlgoTune1.38—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

GPT-5 Mini: 31.1 (#70), Inkling-Small: —

Agentic & Tool Use benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
Terminal-Bench34.8%—
Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard55.5%—
Vending-Bench 2-31.18—

Reasoning Inkling-Small leads

GPT-5 Mini: 23.9 (#168), Inkling-Small: 38.6 (#63)

Reasoning benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
ARC-AGI-24.4%40.1%
ARC-AGI-154.3%84%
CritPt0%8.3%
Chess Puzzles30%18%
LMArena Hard Prompts13801423
Mystery Game Puzzles10%6%
Epoch Capabilities Index145.52150.15
Kagi LLM Benchmark70.3%—
EnigmaEval8.2%—
DTBench80.5%—
LMCA34.2%—
ForecastBench61—

Math GPT-5 Mini leads

GPT-5 Mini: 46.7 (#69), Inkling-Small: 45.1 (#77)

Math benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)46.7%46.3%
FrontierMath Tier 412.2%17.1%
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202586.7%90%
ProofBench9%6%
LMArena Math13781459
Omni-MATH72.2%—
MATH Level 597.8%—
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)27.2%—
FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1)6.3%—

Knowledge Inkling-Small leads

GPT-5 Mini: 45.6 (#86), Inkling-Small: 48.2 (#77)

Knowledge benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
GPQA Diamond75%88.5%
SimpleQA Verified21.6%19.1%
LMArena Expert13791442
Humanity's Last Exam19.4%—
MMLU-Pro83.5%—
Confabulations13.3%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate12.9%—
GPQA (HELM)75.6%—

Multimodal Inkling-Small leads

GPT-5 Mini: 35.6 (#85), Inkling-Small: 39.1 (#62)

Multimodal benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
LMArena Vision12021235
VPCT40.2%—

Multilingual Inkling-Small leads

GPT-5 Mini: 48.9 (#137), Inkling-Small: 51.7 (#104)

Multilingual benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
LMArena Non-English13631402
LMArena Chinese13851465
LMArena French13861436
LMArena German13661405
LMArena Japanese13411405
LMArena Korean13081363
LMArena Russian13621391
LMArena Spanish13551428

Instruction Following GPT-5 Mini leads

GPT-5 Mini: 76.2 (#46), Inkling-Small: 73.8 (#114)

Instruction Following benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
LMArena Instruction Following13571399
IFEval92.7%—

Long Context Too close to call

GPT-5 Mini: 41.9 (#132), Inkling-Small: 42.7 (#118)

Long Context benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
LMArena Longer Query13551401
Fiction.LiveBench69.4%—

Writing & Preference Inkling-Small leads

GPT-5 Mini: 55.2 (#148), Inkling-Small: 59.6 (#107)

Writing & Preference benchmarks
BenchmarkGPT-5 MiniInkling-Small
LMArena Text13731414
LMArena Creative Writing13251331
EQ-Bench Creative Writing13131491
LMArena Multi-Turn13631418
Short-Story Creative Writing83.1%—
WildBench85.5%—

Frequently asked questions

Is GPT-5 Mini better than Inkling-Small?

Inkling-Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.5 to 41.8 on the Noometry Index.

Which is cheaper, GPT-5 Mini 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 Mini lists at $0.25 and $2.

Is GPT-5 Mini or Inkling-Small better for coding?

Inkling-Small scores higher on coding benchmarks: 43.6 versus 40.1 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Inkling-Small does, with 524K tokens against 400K.

How many benchmarks do GPT-5 Mini and Inkling-Small share?

32 benchmarks have published results for both models. GPT-5 Mini has 60 scored results on Noometry and Inkling-Small has 33.

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