# Inkling-Small vs Nova 2 Lite

> Inkling-Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.5 to 39.0 on the Noometry Index.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/inkling-small-vs-nova-2-lite
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 17

## Summary

- They share 17 benchmarks with published results for both. Inkling-Small scores higher in 8 categories and Nova 2 Lite in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Inkling-Small leads 39.0 to 26.4.
- Inkling-Small is cheaper at $0.45 / $1.20 per million input/output tokens, against $0.30 / $2.50 for Nova 2 Lite.
- Nova 2 Lite accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 524K.
- Inkling-Small has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Thinking Machines Lab | Amazon |
| Noometry Index | 46.5 | 39.0 |
| Rank | 57 | 161 |
| Context | 524K | 1M |
| Input $/M | $0.45 | $0.30 |
| Output $/M | $1.20 | $2.50 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Inkling-Small: 43.3 (#80)
- Nova 2 Lite: 40.1 (#131)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1451 | 1386 |
| LMArena WebDev | 1408 | — |
| SciCode | 48.7% | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Inkling-Small: —
- Nova 2 Lite: 23.9 (#114)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| Berkeley Function Calling Leaderboard | — | 27.1% |

## Reasoning

- Inkling-Small: 39.0 (#53)
- Nova 2 Lite: 26.4 (#120)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1424 | 1364 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 40.1% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 84% | — |
| CritPt | 8.3% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 18% | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | 6% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 150.13 | — |

## Math

- Inkling-Small: 44.9 (#65)
- Nova 2 Lite: 34.8 (#154)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1453 | 1359 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 46.3% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 17.1% | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 90% | — |
| ProofBench | 6% | — |

## Knowledge

- Inkling-Small: 48.3 (#71)
- Nova 2 Lite: 42.5 (#88)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1442 | 1360 |
| GPQA Diamond | 88.5% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 19.1% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 5.1% |

## Multimodal

- Inkling-Small: 38.4 (#59)
- Nova 2 Lite: —

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1235 | — |

## Multilingual

- Inkling-Small: 51.7 (#102)
- Nova 2 Lite: 47.3 (#148)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1400 | 1337 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1458 | 1364 |
| LMArena French | 1438 | 1381 |
| LMArena German | 1412 | 1343 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1399 | 1273 |
| LMArena Korean | 1355 | 1284 |
| LMArena Russian | 1392 | 1343 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1426 | 1372 |

## Instruction Following

- Inkling-Small: 73.9 (#112)
- Nova 2 Lite: 70.7 (#156)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1397 | 1335 |

## Long Context

- Inkling-Small: 42.7 (#113)
- Nova 2 Lite: 40.6 (#145)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1401 | 1335 |

## Writing & Preference

- Inkling-Small: 59.8 (#102)
- Nova 2 Lite: 54.1 (#150)

| Benchmark | Inkling-Small | Nova 2 Lite |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1413 | 1362 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1330 | 1291 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1420 | 1338 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1491 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Inkling-Small better than Nova 2 Lite?

Inkling-Small is the stronger model overall, scoring 46.5 to 39.0 on the Noometry Index.

### Which is cheaper, Inkling-Small or Nova 2 Lite?

Inkling-Small is cheaper. It lists at $0.45 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; Nova 2 Lite lists at $0.30 and $2.50.

### Is Inkling-Small or Nova 2 Lite better for coding?

Inkling-Small scores higher on coding benchmarks: 43.3 versus 40.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Nova 2 Lite does, with 1M tokens against 524K.

### How many benchmarks do Inkling-Small and Nova 2 Lite share?

17 benchmarks have published results for both models. Inkling-Small has 33 scored results on Noometry and Nova 2 Lite has 19.