# Inkling vs Nemotron 3.5 Lightning

> Inkling is the stronger model overall, scoring 44.1 to 39.3 on the Noometry Index. Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs 30× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Inkling's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/inkling-vs-nemotron-3-5-lightning
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 18

## Summary

- They share 18 benchmarks with published results for both. Inkling scores higher in 6 categories and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning in 2 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in knowledge, where Inkling leads 55.2 to 36.9.
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is cheaper at $0.06 / $0.16 per million input/output tokens, against $1.87 / $4.68 for Inkling.
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning accepts more context: 262K tokens versus 66K.

## Snapshot

| | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Thinking Machines Lab | NVIDIA |
| Noometry Index | 44.1 | 39.3 |
| Rank | 75 | 156 |
| Context | 66K | 262K |
| Input $/M | $1.87 | $0.06 |
| Output $/M | $4.68 | $0.16 |
| Weights | Open | Open |

## Coding

- Inkling: 34.1 (#229)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 39.6 (#143)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Coding | 1463 | 1370 |
| FrontierCode | 14% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1412 | — |
| FrontierSWE | 4.1% | — |
| SciCode | 47% | — |
| WeirdML | 32.3% | — |
| ALE-Bench | 946 | — |

## Agentic & Tool Use

- Inkling: 29.5 (#76)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: —

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| APEX-Agents | 33.8% | — |
| τ²-bench Banking | 25% | — |

## Reasoning

- Inkling: 40.6 (#48)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 25.7 (#128)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1452 | 1335 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 36.5% | — |
| SimpleBench | 50% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 79.5% | — |
| CritPt | 5.4% | — |
| Chess Puzzles | 21% | — |
| DTBench | 87.5% | — |
| LMCA | 37.6% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 148.6 | — |

## Math

- Inkling: 31.2 (#198)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 34.7 (#156)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Math | 1482 | 1355 |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 33.3% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 4.9% | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 88.9% | — |
| ProofBench | 0% | — |

## Knowledge

- Inkling: 55.2 (#44)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 36.9 (#154)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Expert | 1468 | 1354 |
| GPQA Diamond | 88.3% | — |
| SimpleQA Verified | 40.3% | — |

## Multilingual

- Inkling: 54.2 (#49)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 44.0 (#175)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1434 | 1292 |
| LMArena Chinese | 1495 | 1356 |
| LMArena French | 1453 | 1369 |
| LMArena German | 1456 | 1280 |
| LMArena Japanese | 1428 | 1213 |
| LMArena Korean | 1401 | 1233 |
| LMArena Russian | 1430 | 1257 |
| LMArena Spanish | 1442 | 1321 |

## Instruction Following

- Inkling: 75.3 (#65)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 69.8 (#166)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1427 | 1317 |

## Long Context

- Inkling: 43.9 (#79)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 39.9 (#160)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1436 | 1312 |

## Writing & Preference

- Inkling: 65.5 (#48)
- Nemotron 3.5 Lightning: 48.5 (#198)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Nemotron 3.5 Lightning |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1443 | 1324 |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1390 | 1254 |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1611 | 1280 |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1436 | 1327 |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1226 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Inkling better than Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?

Inkling is the stronger model overall, scoring 44.1 to 39.3 on the Noometry Index. Nemotron 3.5 Lightning costs 30× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Inkling's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

### Which is cheaper, Inkling or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning?

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning is cheaper. It lists at $0.06 per million input tokens and $0.16 per million output tokens; Inkling lists at $1.87 and $4.68.

### Is Inkling or Nemotron 3.5 Lightning better for coding?

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning scores higher on coding benchmarks: 39.6 versus 34.1 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Nemotron 3.5 Lightning does, with 262K tokens against 66K.

### How many benchmarks do Inkling and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning share?

18 benchmarks have published results for both models. Inkling has 41 scored results on Noometry and Nemotron 3.5 Lightning has 18.