Model comparison
Inkling vs Qwen3.5 Plus
Inkling is the stronger model overall, scoring 44.1 to 42.3 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.5 Plus costs 2.9× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Inkling's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Last verified . 8 shared benchmarks.
Alibaba (Qwen)Summary
- They share 8 benchmarks with published results for both. Inkling scores higher in 3 categories and Qwen3.5 Plus in 1 category; 3 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in math, where Qwen3.5 Plus leads 47.9 to 31.2.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is SimpleQA Verified: 40.3% for Inkling and 25.4% for Qwen3.5 Plus.
- Qwen3.5 Plus is cheaper at $0.40 / $2.40 per million input/output tokens, against $1.87 / $4.68 for Inkling.
- Qwen3.5 Plus accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 66K.
- Inkling has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.
Side by side
| Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus | |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Thinking Machines Lab | Alibaba (Qwen) |
| Noometry Index | 44.1 | 42.3 |
| Released | 2026-07-15 | 2026-02-16 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |
| Context window | 66K | 1M |
| Max output | 66K | 66K |
| Input $ / M tokens | $1.87 | $0.40 |
| Output $ / M tokens | $4.68 | $2.40 |
| Results tracked | 41 | 15 |
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Category by category
Coding Not comparable
Inkling: 34.1 (#229), Qwen3.5 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| ALE-Bench | 946 | 621.92 |
| FrontierCode | 14% | — |
| LMArena WebDev | 1412 | — |
| FrontierSWE | 4.1% | — |
| SciCode | 47% | — |
| WeirdML | 32.3% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1463 | — |
Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable
Inkling: 29.5 (#76), Qwen3.5 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| APEX-Agents | 33.8% | — |
| τ²-bench Banking | 25% | — |
| Vending-Bench 2 | — | 0.54 |
Reasoning Inkling leads
Inkling: 40.6 (#48), Qwen3.5 Plus: 32.0 (#67)
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| Chess Puzzles | 21% | 22% |
| DTBench | 87.5% | 80.5% |
| LMCA | 37.6% | 36.4% |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 148.6 | 146.79 |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 36.5% | — |
| SimpleBench | 50% | — |
| ARC-AGI-1 | 79.5% | — |
| CritPt | 5.4% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1452 | — |
| Mystery Game Puzzles | — | 17% |
Math Qwen3.5 Plus leads
Inkling: 31.2 (#198), Qwen3.5 Plus: 47.9 (#55)
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 88.9% | 86.7% |
| FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3) | 33.3% | — |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 | 4.9% | — |
| ProofBench | 0% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1482 | — |
| FrontierMath (Feb 2025 set) | — | 21% |
| FrontierMath Tier 4 (v1) | — | 2.1% |
Knowledge Inkling leads
Inkling: 55.2 (#44), Qwen3.5 Plus: 46.0 (#78)
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 88.3% | 84.8% |
| SimpleQA Verified | 40.3% | 25.4% |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | — | 10.7% |
| LMArena Expert | 1468 | — |
Multilingual Not comparable
Inkling: 54.2 (#49), Qwen3.5 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1434 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1495 | — |
| LMArena French | 1453 | — |
| LMArena German | 1456 | — |
| LMArena Japanese | 1428 | — |
| LMArena Korean | 1401 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1430 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1442 | — |
Instruction Following Not comparable
Inkling: 75.3 (#65), Qwen3.5 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1427 | — |
Long Context Too close to call
Inkling: 43.9 (#79), Qwen3.5 Plus: 42.9 (#109)
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| CL-bench | — | 19.8% |
| CL-bench Life | — | 12.4% |
| LMArena Longer Query | 1436 | — |
Writing & Preference Not comparable
Inkling: 65.5 (#48), Qwen3.5 Plus: —
| Benchmark | Inkling | Qwen3.5 Plus |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1443 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1390 | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1611 | — |
| EQ-Bench 4 | 1226 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1436 | — |
Frequently asked questions
Is Inkling better than Qwen3.5 Plus?
Inkling is the stronger model overall, scoring 44.1 to 42.3 on the Noometry Index. Qwen3.5 Plus costs 2.9× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Inkling's lead doesn't matter for your workload.
Which is cheaper, Inkling or Qwen3.5 Plus?
Qwen3.5 Plus is cheaper. It lists at $0.40 per million input tokens and $2.40 per million output tokens; Inkling lists at $1.87 and $4.68.
Which has the bigger context window?
Qwen3.5 Plus does, with 1M tokens against 66K.
How many benchmarks do Inkling and Qwen3.5 Plus share?
8 benchmarks have published results for both models. Inkling has 41 scored results on Noometry and Qwen3.5 Plus has 15.