Inkling Small vs Trinity Large Thinking
Which is better for the money: Inkling Small by Thinking Machines or Trinity Large Thinking by Arcee AI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-09-09.
Clear winner
Verdict
Pick Inkling Small
Trinity Large Thinking vs Inkling Small: 58.2% less intelligence, 115.1% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 59.9% faster end-to-end.
| Metric | Inkling Small | Trinity Large Thinking | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 26.1 | 10.9 | −58.2% Trinity Large Thinking is 58.2% less intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $240.85 | $518.07 | +115.1% Trinity Large Thinking is 2.2× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 21.89s | 8.78s | −59.9% Trinity Large Thinking is 59.9% faster |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.30 / $1.20 | $0.25 / $0.90 | |
| Input modalities | Not reported | Not reported |
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Inkling Small is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-5.6 Luna (xhigh) scores 34.80 for $179.
- Trinity Large Thinking is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GLM-5.3-Flash scores 41.90 for $280.
Inkling SmallTrinity Large ThinkingToday's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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