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Inkling-Small vs Qwen3.8 Flash

Qwen3.8 Flash leads the LLM Stats Score 49.2 to 38.9. Qwen3.8 Flash is 2.3x cheaper per token.

Thinking Machines Lab · Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team · Updated for 2026

Which is better?

Qwen3.8 Flash leads the overall LLM Stats Score 49.2 to 38.9, ranking #20 overall.

In the 6 individual benchmarks reported for both models, Qwen3.8 Flash wins 5; this is a narrower head-to-head signal than the composite indexes.

On price, Qwen3.8 Flash is roughly 2.3x cheaper per token on a blended 3:1 input/output basis, which adds up quickly at production volume.

Qwen3.8 Flash also accepts a larger context window (1,000,000 input tokens), making it the stronger choice for long documents and large codebases.

Based on current LLM Stats indexes, shared benchmarks, pricing, and model metadata for 2026.

Choose Inkling-Small

  • you need open weights you can self-host or fine-tune

Choose Qwen3.8 Flash

  • overall performance matters — it scores 49.2 and ranks #20 on LLM Stats
  • your work emphasizes reasoning and agents — it leads those capability indexes
  • you value its reported benchmark strengths — it wins 5 of 6 exact shared results
  • cost matters — it's about 2.3x cheaper per token
  • you process long inputs — it offers a 1,000,000 token context window
  • you want the most recent training data — it shipped Aug 2026

At a glance

The differences that matter most.

Inkling-Small
Thinking Machines Lab
Qwen3.8 Flash
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Core performance indexes
LLM Stats Score
38.9
#59
49.2
#20
Reasoning
38.5
#58
48.8
#19
Coding
29.3
#51
36.0
#23
Agents
22.9
#52
34.6
#19
Cost, coverage & limits
Benchmark wins
1 of 6
5 of 6
Input price
$0.30 / M
$0.15 / M
Output price
$1.20 / M
$0.47 / M
Context window
256,000
1,000,000

Capability indexes

Additional strengths measured across groups of related public benchmarks

4 shared
Index
Inkling-Small
Qwen3.8 Flash
Math
34.0#50
32.5#56
Vision
19.5#69
33.9#14
Tool use
21.6#49
30.6#14
Multimodal
17.7#73
35.6#10
Conservative TrueSkill rating · higher is betterHow scores work

Individual benchmarks

24 reported for Inkling-Small · 22 for Qwen3.8 Flash

6 shared

Inkling-Small outperforms in 1 benchmarks (IFBench), while Qwen3.8 Flash is better at 5 benchmarks (CharXiv-R, GPQA, Humanity's Last Exam, SWE-Bench Pro, Toolathlon).

Qwen3.8 Flash significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.

Sat Sep 05 2026 • llm-stats.com

Human preference

Blind head-to-head votes and playground preference scores

Pricing Analysis

Price comparison per million tokens

Qwen3.8 Flash costs less

For input processing, Inkling-Small ($0.30/1M tokens) is 2.0x more expensive than Qwen3.8 Flash ($0.15/1M tokens).

For output processing, Inkling-Small ($1.20/1M tokens) is 2.6x more expensive than Qwen3.8 Flash ($0.47/1M tokens).

In conclusion, Inkling-Small is more expensive than Qwen3.8 Flash.*

* Using a 3:1 ratio of input to output tokens

Lowest available price from all providers
Sat Sep 05 2026 • llm-stats.com
Thinking Machines Lab
Inkling-Small
Input tokens$0.30
Output tokens$1.20
Best providerUnknown Organization
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.8 Flash
Input tokens$0.15
Output tokens$0.47
Best providerNovita
Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue→

Model Size

Parameter count comparison

151.0B diff

Inkling-Small has 151.0B more parameters than Qwen3.8 Flash, making it 120.8% larger.

Thinking Machines Lab
Inkling-Small
276.0Bparameters
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.8 Flash
125.0Bparameters
276.0B
Inkling-Small
125.0B
Qwen3.8 Flash

Context Window

Maximum input and output token capacity

Qwen3.8 Flash accepts 1,000,000 input tokens compared to Inkling-Small's 256,000 tokens. Inkling-Small can generate longer responses up to 256,000 tokens, while Qwen3.8 Flash is limited to 131,072 tokens.

Thinking Machines Lab
Inkling-Small
Input256,000 tokens
Output256,000 tokens
Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team
Qwen3.8 Flash
Input1,000,000 tokens
Output131,072 tokens
Sat Sep 05 2026 • llm-stats.com

Input capabilities

Documented input modalities across available providers

Both Inkling-Small and Qwen3.8 Flash support multimodal inputs.

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

Inkling-Small

Text
Images
Audio
Video

Qwen3.8 Flash

Text
Images
Audio
Video

License

Usage and distribution terms

Inkling-Small is licensed under Apache 2.0, while Qwen3.8 Flash uses a proprietary license.

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

Inkling-Small

Apache 2.0

Open weights

Qwen3.8 Flash

Proprietary

Closed source

Release Timeline

When each model was launched

Inkling-Small was released on 2026-07-30, while Qwen3.8 Flash was released on 2026-08-26.

Qwen3.8 Flash is 1 month newer than Inkling-Small.

Inkling-Small

Jul 30, 2026

1 months ago

Qwen3.8 Flash

Aug 26, 2026

1 weeks ago

3w 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

Provider Availability

Inkling-Small is available from Thinking Machines Lab. Qwen3.8 Flash is available from Novita.

Inkling-Small

thinking-machines logo
Unknown Organization
Input Price:Input: $0.30/1MOutput Price:Output: $1.20/1M

Qwen3.8 Flash

novita logo
Novita
Input Price:Input: $0.15/1MOutput Price:Output: $0.47/1M
* Prices shown are per million tokens

Outputs Comparison

Notice missing or incorrect data?Start an Issue discussion→

Judge for yourself.

Run your own prompts against Inkling-Small and Qwen3.8 Flash side-by-side, then vote on the output you prefer.

Inkling-Small
✓ Preferred
Qwen3.8 Flash
Open in Playground

FAQ

Common questions about Inkling-Small vs Qwen3.8 Flash.

Which is better, Inkling-Small or Qwen3.8 Flash?

Qwen3.8 Flash leads the LLM Stats Score 49.2 to 38.9. Inkling-Small is made by Thinking Machines Lab and Qwen3.8 Flash is made by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team. The best choice depends on your use case — compare their capability indexes, individual benchmarks, pricing, and limits above.

How does Inkling-Small compare to Qwen3.8 Flash 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%. Qwen3.8 Flash scores MathVision: 95.7%, LiveCodeBench v6: 91.9%, GPQA: 91.7%, CharXiv-R: 90.6%, RealWorldQA: 88.5%.

Is Inkling-Small cheaper than Qwen3.8 Flash?

Qwen3.8 Flash is 2.0x cheaper for input tokens. Inkling-Small costs $0.30/M input and $1.20/M output via thinking-machines. Qwen3.8 Flash costs $0.15/M input and $0.47/M output via novita.

What are the context window sizes for Inkling-Small and Qwen3.8 Flash?

Inkling-Small supports 256K tokens and Qwen3.8 Flash supports 1.0M 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 Qwen3.8 Flash?

Key differences include LLM Stats Score (38.9 vs 49.2), context window (256K vs 1.0M), input pricing ($0.30 vs $0.15/M), licensing (Apache 2.0 vs Proprietary). See the full comparison above for benchmark-by-benchmark results.

Who makes Inkling-Small and Qwen3.8 Flash?

Inkling-Small is developed by Thinking Machines Lab and Qwen3.8 Flash is developed by Alibaba Cloud / Qwen Team.

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