Noometry

Model comparison

Inkling-Small vs Qwen Max

Inkling-Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.5 to 34.7 on the Noometry Index.

Last verified . 19 shared benchmarks.

Inkling-Small Thinking Machines Lab

46.5

Rank #63 Confirmed

Qwen Max Alibaba (Qwen)

34.7

Rank #230 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 19 benchmarks with published results for both. Inkling-Small scores higher in 8 categories and Qwen Max in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in math, where Inkling-Small leads 45.1 to 22.3.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025: 90% for Inkling-Small and 16.1% for Qwen Max.
  • Inkling-Small is cheaper at $0.45 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $1.60 / $6.40 for Qwen Max.
  • Inkling-Small accepts more context: 524K tokens versus 33K.
  • Inkling-Small has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Inkling-SmallQwen Max
ProviderThinking Machines LabAlibaba (Qwen)
Noometry Index46.534.7
Released2026-07-152024-04-03
WeightsOpenProprietary
Context window524K33K
Max output1.05M8K
Input $ / M tokens$0.45$1.60
Output $ / M tokens$1.20$6.40
Results tracked3323

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Category by category

Coding Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 43.6 (#85), Qwen Max: 30.7 (#292)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Coding14511288
Aider Polyglot—21.8%
LMArena WebDev1409—
SciCode48.7%—

Reasoning Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 38.6 (#63), Qwen Max: 25.1 (#151)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Hard Prompts14231269
ARC-AGI-240.1%—
ARC-AGI-184%—
CritPt8.3%—
Chess Puzzles18%—
Mystery Game Puzzles6%—
Epoch Capabilities Index150.15—

Math Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 45.1 (#77), Qwen Max: 22.3 (#276)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202590%16.1%
LMArena Math14591275
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)46.3%—
FrontierMath Tier 417.1%—
ProofBench6%—
MATH Level 5—67.2%
FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set)—1%

Knowledge Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 48.2 (#77), Qwen Max: 30.3 (#228)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
GPQA Diamond88.5%56.1%
LMArena Expert14421248
SimpleQA Verified19.1%—

Multimodal Not comparable

Inkling-Small: 39.1 (#62), Qwen Max: —

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Vision1235—

Multilingual Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 51.7 (#104), Qwen Max: 41.8 (#202)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Non-English14021263
LMArena Chinese14651254
LMArena French14361330
LMArena German14051254
LMArena Japanese14051205
LMArena Korean13631142
LMArena Russian13911274
LMArena Spanish14281290

Instruction Following Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 73.8 (#114), Qwen Max: 66.5 (#208)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Instruction Following13991262

Long Context Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 42.7 (#118), Qwen Max: 39.4 (#180)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Longer Query14011288
Fiction.LiveBench—66.7%

Writing & Preference Inkling-Small leads

Inkling-Small: 59.6 (#107), Qwen Max: 47.8 (#205)

BenchmarkInkling-SmallQwen Max
LMArena Text14141282
LMArena Creative Writing13311248
LMArena Multi-Turn14181277
EQ-Bench Creative Writing1491—

Frequently asked questions

Is Inkling-Small better than Qwen Max?

Inkling-Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.5 to 34.7 on the Noometry Index.

Which is cheaper, Inkling-Small or Qwen Max?

Inkling-Small is cheaper. It lists at $0.45 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; Qwen Max lists at $1.60 and $6.40.

Is Inkling-Small or Qwen Max better for coding?

Inkling-Small scores higher on coding benchmarks: 43.6 versus 30.7 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Inkling-Small does, with 524K tokens against 33K.

How many benchmarks do Inkling-Small and Qwen Max share?

19 benchmarks have published results for both models. Inkling-Small has 33 scored results on Noometry and Qwen Max has 23.

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