Inkling Small API pricing
thinkingmachines · Budget price tier · Apache 2.0 · released 2026-07. Prices in USD per 1 million tokens. Data snapshot: 2026-11-12.
A support ticket workload of 100K requests a month costs $127.50 on Inkling Small; the next cheaper model in the Budget price tier for this workload, Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Instruct, does it for $126.50. Inkling Small has held the same list price since 2026-08-15 and is the 133rd cheapest of 160 models in the Budget price tier. Only one host, DeepInfra, sells it, so there is no second price to shop. It is rated a stable release but does not meet all four criteria of the FinOps Friendly badge.
- Input: $0.45 per 1M tokens
- Output: $1.20 per 1M tokens
- Batch API (in/out): $0.36 / $0.96 per 1M tokens
- Prompt-cache read: $0.10 per 1M tokens
- Context window: 524K tokens
- Arena ELO: 1414 as of 2026-11-08
Market position
On blended price ($0.975 per 1M tokens at 30% input, 70% output) it is cheaper than 17% of models in the Budget price tier: 133rd cheapest of 160. Across every price tier it is cheaper than 56% of priced text models in the catalogue: 133rd cheapest of 303. Its Arena ELO of 1414 ranks 87th of the 160 models that carry one, above 46% of them. With an Arena score of 1414, Inkling Small sits below OptimNow's lowest working quality threshold, Standard (Arena 1420+), so the quality-bar method would not shortlist it for any of the 8 use cases the table prices. It is 6 points under the Standard bar (Arena 1420+), within the benchmark's 20-point noise. Each threshold is a distance below the best ranked model, which scores 1530 on Arena scores as of 8 Nov 2026.
Licence, size and capabilities
Inkling Small is open source: its weights are published under Apache 2.0, an OSI-approved licence with no field-of-use limit, so it can be self-hosted as well as bought by the token. Its published size is 276B parameters. Listed capabilities: Text, Vision, Audio, Reasoning, Agents. Filling its 524K context window once costs $0.2358 in input tokens at list price.
Pricing by host
A host is a company that runs the model and sells it by the token: the model maker, a cloud platform like Amazon Bedrock, Azure or Vertex, or an independent host. One model, several hosts, and often several prices. This model is sold by 1 host. The price we quote elsewhere on this page is marked. We quote one host's rate so that models stay comparable; it is not a recommendation to buy there.
DeepInfra is the only host with a published rate, $0.45 input / $1.20 output per 1M tokens, which is the price we quote. It serves a quantized fp8 build, which is not the same product as the full-precision model.
| Host | Input $/1M | Output $/1M | Precision |
|---|---|---|---|
| DeepInfra (price we quote) | $0.45 | $1.20 | fp8 |
List prices as published on 2026-11-12, via OpenRouter. Negotiated rates, committed-use discounts and provisioned capacity are not shown.
Monthly cost at 100K requests, by business use case
From the after-discounts figure (prompt caching on the cached input share, batch API for async workloads, only where thinkingmachines publishes those rates), which assumes you implement both, to the list price. One figure means no discount is published.
| Use case | Tokens (in/out) | Monthly (after discounts – list) |
|---|---|---|
| Support Ticket | 1,500 / 500 | $96 – $128 |
| Knowledge Q&A | 2,000 / 800 | $137 – $186 |
| Meeting Summary | 10,000 / 1,200 | $449 – $594 |
| Marketing Content | 2,500 / 1,800 | $311 – $329 |
| Coding Task | 3,000 / 2,000 | $323 – $375 |
| Invoice Processing | 1,500 / 600 | $100 – $140 |
| Call Summary | 2,000 / 700 | $134 – $174 |
| Agent Workflow | 6,000 / 3,000 | $483 – $630 |
Price history
Inkling Small has been in our daily price archive since tracking began on 2026-08-15, when it listed at $0.45 input / $1.20 output per 1M tokens. No list price change since tracking began on 2026-08-15. Last checked against the 2026-11-12 snapshot.
Alternatives to Inkling Small
3 of the 4 comparable models below cost less than Inkling Small: Qwen3 235B A22B Instruct 2507 undercuts it by 38%, and scores 5 Arena points higher.
- Next cheaper model in the Budget price tier: Qwen2.5 VL 72B Instruct (Alibaba) at $0.94 blended, 4% less.
- Next more expensive: GLM 5.3 FlashX (Zhipu) at $0.986 blended, 1% more.
The nearest models in the Budget price tier on Arena ELO, each with its blended price and score difference against Inkling Small.
- DeepSeek V3.1 Terminus (DeepSeek): $0.27 in / $1.00 out per 1M, Arena ELO 1417 (20% cheaper, 3 ELO points higher)
- Qwen3 Next 80B A3B Instruct (Alibaba): $0.09 in / $1.10 out per 1M, Arena ELO 1417 (18% cheaper, 3 ELO points higher)
- Qwen3 235B A22B Instruct 2507 (Alibaba): $0.14 in / $0.80 out per 1M, Arena ELO 1419 (38% cheaper, 5 ELO points higher)
- Qwen3 VL 235B A22B Instruct (Alibaba): $0.21 in / $1.90 out per 1M, Arena ELO 1420 (43% more expensive, 6 ELO points higher)
- Cheapest within 15 Arena points: Step 3.5 Flash (StepFun), 75% cheaper, 11 ELO points lower, out of 30 models in that band.
- Highest Arena ELO within 20% of this price: GLM 5.3 (Zhipu), 3% more expensive, 62 ELO points higher, out of 16 models in that price band.
Other models from Thinking Machines
Thinking Machines has 1 other model in the catalogue. Prices per 1M tokens, input then output.
- Inkling: $1.00 / $4.05
Common questions about Inkling Small pricing
- How much does Inkling Small cost?
- Inkling Small costs $0.45 per 1M input tokens and $1.20 per 1M output tokens at DeepInfra, the host whose rate we quote. DeepInfra serves a quantized fp8 build, which is not the same product as the full-precision model. Prices as listed on 2026-11-12.
- Which host is cheapest for Inkling Small?
- DeepInfra is the only host with a published rate, $0.45 input / $1.20 output per 1M tokens, which is the price we quote. It serves a quantized fp8 build, which is not the same product as the full-precision model. Host rates as listed on 2026-11-12.
- Does Inkling Small offer batch or cached pricing?
- Yes, both. Batch API pricing is $0.36 per 1M input tokens and $0.96 per 1M output tokens, and prompt-cache reads cost $0.10 per 1M tokens, as listed on 2026-11-12.
- What would Inkling Small cost per month?
- With the Support Ticket profile (1,500 input and 500 output tokens per request), 100,000 requests a month cost about $128 on Inkling Small at the list price quoted on 2026-11-12.
- Can Inkling Small be self-hosted?
- Yes. Inkling Small is open source: its weights are published under Apache 2.0, an OSI-approved licence with no field-of-use limit, so it can be self-hosted as well as bought by the token.
- Has the price of Inkling Small changed?
- Inkling Small has been in our daily price archive since tracking began on 2026-08-15, when it listed at $0.45 input / $1.20 output per 1M tokens. No list price change since tracking began on 2026-08-15. Last checked against the 2026-11-12 snapshot.
Its weights are published, which changes what you may run yourself: the cost gap between open weights and proprietary APIs.
These are list prices. Your real cost also depends on caching and batching, negotiated discounts, marketplace agreements, and the contracts you already have. OptimNow audits exactly that.
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