Inkling 2 Small vs Qwen3.8 Max (0902)
Which is better for the money: Inkling 2 Small by Thinking Machines or Qwen3.8 Max (0902) by Alibaba? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-11-06.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
Qwen3.8 Max (0902) scores 3.1 points higher (33.7 vs 30.6) but costs 8.0× as much to run the benchmark ($6354 vs $792; flagship vs premium cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick Qwen3.8 Max (0902) when you need intelligence above 30.6, and Inkling 2 Small when 30.6 is enough.
| Metric | Inkling 2 Small | Qwen3.8 Max (0902) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 30.6 | 33.7 | +10.1% Qwen3.8 Max (0902) is 10.1% more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $791.81 | $6,353.83 | +702.4% Qwen3.8 Max (0902) is 8.0× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 20.92s | 69.43s | +231.9% Qwen3.8 Max (0902) is 231.9% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.30 / $1.00 | $2.00 / $6.00 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image | Text, Image |
Qwen3.8 Max (0902) vs Inkling 2 Small: 10.1% more intelligence, 702.4% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 231.9% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Inkling 2 Small is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6.1 Sol (Xhigh) scores 52.50 for $718.
- Qwen3.8 Max (0902) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Gemini 4 Carbon (Medium) scores 58.30 for $5903.
Inkling 2 SmallQwen3.8 Max (0902)Today's Pareto frontierEvery other model
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/inkling-2-small/qwen3-8-max · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/inkling-2-small/qwen3-8-max?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill