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Inkling-Small vs LFM2.5-VL-3B

Inkling-Small significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Thinking Machines Lab · Liquid AI · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Inkling-Small outperforms in 2 benchmarks (IFBench, MMMU-Pro), while LFM2.5-VL-3B is better at 0 benchmarks. Inkling-Small significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Based on current benchmark, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Inkling-Small

  • you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 2 of 2 shared benchmarks

Choose LFM2.5-VL-3B

  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Aug 2026

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Inkling-Small
Thinking Machines Lab
LFM2.5-VL-3B
Liquid AI
Benchmark wins
2 of 2
0 of 2
Input price
$0.30 / M
— / M
Output price
$1.20 / M
— / M
Context window
256,000
—
Released
Jul 2026
Aug 2026
License
Apache 2.0
LFM Open License v1.0

Performance Benchmarks

Comparative analysis across standard metrics

2 benchmarks

Inkling-Small outperforms in 2 benchmarks (IFBench, MMMU-Pro), while LFM2.5-VL-3B is better at 0 benchmarks.

Inkling-Small significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Tue Aug 25 2026 • llm-stats.com

Arena Performance

Playground indexes and blind preference scores

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

272.9B diff

Inkling-Small has 272.9B more parameters than LFM2.5-VL-3B, making it 8736.3% larger.

Thinking Machines Lab
Inkling-Small
276.0Bparameters
Liquid AI
LFM2.5-VL-3B
3.1Bparameters
276.0B
Inkling-Small
3.1B
LFM2.5-VL-3B

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Only Inkling-Small specifies input context (256,000 tokens). Only Inkling-Small specifies output context (256,000 tokens).

Thinking Machines Lab
Inkling-Small
Input256,000 tokens
Output256,000 tokens
Liquid AI
LFM2.5-VL-3B
Input- tokens
Output- tokens
Tue Aug 25 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input Capabilities

Supported data types and modalities

Both Inkling-Small and LFM2.5-VL-3B support multimodal inputs.

They are both capable of processing various types of data, offering versatility in application.

Inkling-Small

Text
Images
Audio
Video

LFM2.5-VL-3B

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Inkling-Small is licensed under Apache 2.0, while LFM2.5-VL-3B uses LFM Open License v1.0.

License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.

Inkling-Small

Apache 2.0

Open weights

LFM2.5-VL-3B

LFM Open License v1.0

Open weights

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Inkling-Small was released on 2026-07-30, while LFM2.5-VL-3B was released on 2026-08-12.

LFM2.5-VL-3B is 0 month newer than Inkling-Small.

Inkling-Small

Jul 30, 2026

3 weeks ago

LFM2.5-VL-3B

Aug 12, 2026

1 weeks ago

1w newer

Knowledge Cutoff

When training data ends

Neither model specifies a knowledge cutoff date.

Unable to compare the recency of their training data.

No cutoff dates available

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Inkling-Small and LFM2.5-VL-3B side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Inkling-Small
✓ Preferred
LFM2.5-VL-3B
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Inkling-Small vs LFM2.5-VL-3B.

Which is better, Inkling-Small or LFM2.5-VL-3B?

Inkling-Small significantly outperforms across most benchmarks. Inkling-Small is made by Thinking Machines Lab and LFM2.5-VL-3B is made by Liquid AI. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their benchmark scores, pricing, and capabilities above.

How does Inkling-Small compare to LFM2.5-VL-3B in benchmarks?

Inkling-Small scores AIME 2026: 95.5%, VoiceBench Avg: 90.1%, GPQA: 89.5%, Global-MMLU-Lite: 86.7%, ARC-AGI: 84.0%. LFM2.5-VL-3B scores DocVQA: 91.1%, POPE: 88.7%, RefCOCO-avg: 87.9%, TextVQA: 84.3%, OCRBench: 84.2%.

What are the context window sizes for Inkling-Small and LFM2.5-VL-3B?

Inkling-Small supports 256K tokens and LFM2.5-VL-3B supports an unknown number of tokens. A larger context window lets you process longer documents, conversations, or codebases in a single request.

What are the main differences between Inkling-Small and LFM2.5-VL-3B?

Key differences include licensing (Apache 2.0 vs LFM Open License v1.0). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Inkling-Small and LFM2.5-VL-3B?

Inkling-Small is developed by Thinking Machines Lab and LFM2.5-VL-3B is developed by Liquid AI.

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