Claude Opus 5 (High) vs Inkling Small
Which is better for the money: Claude Opus 5 (High) by Anthropic or Inkling Small by Thinking Machines? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-25.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Claude Opus 5 (High) scores 22.4 points higher (48.1 vs 25.7) but costs 18× as much to run the benchmark ($4332 vs $241; flagship vs mid-range cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Claude Opus 5 (High) when you need intelligence above 25.7, and Inkling Small when 25.7 is enough.
| Metric | Claude Opus 5 (High) | Inkling Small | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 48.1 | 25.7 | −46.6% Inkling Small is 46.6% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $4,331.68 | $240.85 | −94.4% Inkling Small is 94.4% cheaper |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 20.73s | 12.68s | −38.8% Inkling Small is 38.8% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $5.00 / $25.0 | $0.30 / $1.20 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image, Speech |
Inkling Small vs Claude Opus 5 (High): 46.6% less intelligence, 94.4% less cost to run the AA benchmark, and 38.8% faster end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Claude Opus 5 (High) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) scores 56.00 for $4057.
- Inkling Small is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, MiMo-V2.6-Pro scores 46.30 for $207.
Claude Opus 5 (High)Inkling SmallToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
Compare something else
Agents:
Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-high/inkling-small · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/claude-opus-5-high/inkling-small?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill