// alternatives · November 2026
Inkling 2 Small alternatives
Cheaper models that come close, budget substitutes, and the cheapest step up — chosen on published LiveBench scores and live list price, never on our opinion. Every model here supports tool calling and image input, as Inkling 2 Small does.
LiveBench hasn't published a run for Inkling 2 Small. The strongest benchmarked model at a similar or lower price is DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017, scoring 70.3 overall.
Inkling 2 Small: no published LiveBench run, $0.475 per 1M blended tokens, about $192.00/mo for a RAG assistant.
Benchmarked models at or below its price
Inkling 2 Small has no published LiveBench run, so these are the highest-scoring benchmarked models priced no more than 25% above it — a known quantity to test against.
| Model | Overall | vs Inkling 2 Small | Blended / 1M | RAG assistant | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017deepseek 11% more expensive. Head to head → | 70.3 | — | $0.525 | $194.40/mo | 1.0M |
| Claude Haiku 5.5anthropic 58% cheaper. Head to head → | 68.9 | — | $0.200−58% | $74.00/mo | 1M |
| MiMo-V2.6-Proxiaomi 14% more expensive. Head to head → | 66.1 | — | $0.544 | $227.64/mo | 1.1M |
| MiniMax M3.1 Flashminimax 45% cheaper. Head to head → | 63.7 | — | $0.262−45% | $102.00/mo | 1.0M |
| GLM 5.3 Flashz-ai 90% cheaper. Head to head → | 60.7 | — | $0.050−90% | $32.66/mo | 1.0M |
| GPT-6 Lunaopenai 58% cheaper. Head to head → | 60.4 | — | $0.200−58% | $74.00/mo | 1.1M |
Inkling 2 Small alternatives FAQ
What is the best alternative to Inkling 2 Small?
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1017. 11% more expensive. Every suggestion supports tool calling and image input, like Inkling 2 Small.
How alternatives are chosen
- Scores — LiveBench release 2026-11-06. Only models with a published run are suggested on quality; a missing model means “not evaluated”, not “worse”.
- Prices — live list prices from OpenRouter, blended 3:1 input:output. Monthly figures price a RAG assistant with the published cached-input rate where there is one.
- Same job — suggestions must support every capability Inkling 2 Small has among tool calling and image input. Other listings of the same model (free or batch tiers) are variants, not alternatives, and are left out.
A few points on a public benchmark can hide large differences on your own tasks. Shortlist here, then decide with an eval — how to build one.