Inkling Small vs DeepSeek V4.1 Flash vs Qwen3.8 27B
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash comes out ahead, 78 to 70 and 67 on our weighted score, and it is the cheaper option too.
Thinking MachinesInkling Small
70/100- ECI150.2
- Price$0.50 / $1.20
- Context1.05M
- Our pick
DeepSeekDeepSeek V4.1 Flash
78/100- ECI155.0
- Price$0.15 / $0.60
- Context1M
Alibaba (Qwen)Qwen3.8 27B
67/100- ECI149.4
- Price$0.40 / $2.50
- Context262K
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is our pick
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is the better all-round choice, scoring 78/100 against Inkling Small (70) and Qwen3.8 27B (67). It leads on capability and price. Qwen3.8 27B wins on inputs & features. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
- CapabilityDeepSeek V4.1 FlashCapabilities Index (ECI): DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 155.0 · Inkling Small 150.2 · Qwen3.8 27B 149.4
- Lowest priceDeepSeek V4.1 FlashDeepSeek V4.1 Flash $0.263 · Inkling Small $0.675 · Qwen3.8 27B $0.925 per 1M tokens (3:1 blend)
- Longest contextInkling SmallInkling Small 1,048,576 · DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 1,000,000 · Qwen3.8 27B 262,144 tokens
- Widest inputsInkling Small and Qwen3.8 27BInkling Small: Text, Images, Audio · DeepSeek V4.1 Flash: Text, Images · Qwen3.8 27B: Text, Images, Video
- Self-hostingAll open weightsEvery model here can be downloaded and run on your own hardware
| Measure | Weight | Inkling Small | DeepSeek V4.1 Flash | Qwen3.8 27B |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| CapabilityCapabilities Index (ECI) | 50% | 78 | 84 | 77 |
| Price | 25% | 58 | 77 | 51 |
| Inputs & features | 15% | 70 | 70 | 80 |
| Context window | 10% | 61 | 60 | 37 |
| Overall | 100% | 70/100 | 78/100 | 67/100 |
Every spec in one table
Highlighted cells lead their row. Dashes mean the data is not published.
| Specification | Inkling SmallThinking Machines | DeepSeek V4.1 FlashDeepSeek | Qwen3.8 27BAlibaba (Qwen) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | |||
| Capabilities Index (ECI) | 150.2 | 155.0 (best) | 149.4 |
| ECI rank | #47 of 148 | #29 of 148 (best) | #53 of 148 |
| GPQA DiamondGraduate-level science questions | 88.5% | — | — |
| FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Research-level mathematics | 46.3% | — | — |
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024–2025Competition mathematics | 90.0% | — | — |
| SimpleQA VerifiedShort factual questions | 19.1% | — | — |
| Price per million tokens | |||
| Input | $0.50 | $0.15 (best) | $0.40 |
| Output | $1.20 | $0.60 (best) | $2.50 |
| Cached input | — | $0.003 | — |
| Blended (3:1) | $0.675 | $0.263 (best) | $0.925 |
| Long-context rate | Same rate | Same rate | Same rate |
| Price source | Median of 11 providers | Official DeepSeek API | Median of 39 providers |
| Limits | |||
| Context window | 1,048,576 tokens (best) | 1,000,000 tokens | 262,144 tokens |
| Max output | 1,048,576 tokens (best) | 384,000 tokens | 32,768 tokens |
| Inputs and features | |||
| Text | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Images | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| PDFs | No | No | No |
| Audio | Yes | No | No |
| Video | No | No | Yes |
| Reasoning | Yes | Yeslow · high · max | Yes |
| Tool calling | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Structured output | No | Yes | Yes |
| Availability | |||
| Weights | OpenApache-2.0 | OpenMIT | Open |
| API model ID | — | deepseek-flash | — |
| API providers | 11 | 50 (best) | 41 |
| Released | Jul 30, 2026 | Sep 10, 2026 | Aug 14, 2026 |
| Knowledge cutoff | — | May 2025 | — |
What would a month cost?
Enter your expected volume in millions of tokens. List prices only; caching and batch discounts would lower these.
- Inkling Small$7.40
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash$2.70
- Qwen3.8 27B$9.00
Which should you choose?
Which is better: Inkling Small, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash or Qwen3.8 27B?
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is the better all-round choice, scoring 78/100 against Inkling Small (70) and Qwen3.8 27B (67). It leads on capability and price. Qwen3.8 27B wins on inputs & features. The score weighs capability 50%, price 25%, inputs & features 15%, context window 10%.
Which is cheaper, Inkling Small, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash or Qwen3.8 27B?
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is cheaper at $0.15 input / $0.60 output per million tokens (official DeepSeek API price). Inkling Small costs $0.50 input / $1.20 output per million tokens (median across 11 API providers); Qwen3.8 27B costs $0.40 input / $2.50 output per million tokens (median across 39 API providers). At a typical mix of three input tokens to one output token, that is $0.263 per million tokens for DeepSeek V4.1 Flash versus $0.675 for Inkling Small (2.6× as much) and $0.925 for Qwen3.8 27B (3.5× as much).
Which scores higher on benchmarks?
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash scores higher on the Capabilities Index (ECI): DeepSeek V4.1 Flash 155.0 (#29 of 148), Inkling Small 150.2 (#47 of 148) and Qwen3.8 27B 149.4 (#53 of 148). The confidence ranges of the top two overlap (148.8–157.6 vs 147.5–152.1), so treat the gap as small.
Which is better for coding?
There are no published SWE-bench Verified results for Inkling Small, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and Qwen3.8 27B yet, so there is no like-for-like coding score. On overall capability, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash leads, which tends to carry over to coding, but test on your own codebase. All three support tool calling for agent workflows.
Which has the bigger context window?
Inkling Small has the largest context window at 1,048,576 tokens, against 1,000,000 for DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and 262,144 for Qwen3.8 27B. Maximum output per response: Inkling Small up to 1,048,576, DeepSeek V4.1 Flash up to 384,000, Qwen3.8 27B up to 32,768 tokens.
Which can read images, PDFs, audio or video?
Inkling Small accepts text, images and audio; DeepSeek V4.1 Flash accepts text and images; Qwen3.8 27B accepts text, images and video. Inkling Small handles the widest range of inputs.
Are any of these open source?
Yes, all three publish their weights (Apache-2.0 and MIT), so you can self-host them.
Which is newer?
DeepSeek V4.1 Flash is the newest, released Sep 10, 2026. Qwen3.8 27B came out Aug 14, 2026; Inkling Small came out Jul 30, 2026. Knowledge cutoff: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash May 2025.
How do you decide the winner?
Each model gets a 0–100 score on capability (50%, independent benchmark results); price (25%, blended price per million tokens (3 input : 1 output), log scale); inputs & features (15%, image, PDF, audio and video input, tool calling, structured output and reasoning); context window (10%, maximum tokens per request, log scale). Dimensions missing for any model are dropped and the remaining weights rescaled, so every model is judged on the same evidence. Specs and prices come from public model listings and the labs’ own API pages; capability scores come from independent benchmark runs. Data updated Oct 4, 2026.
Related comparisons
- Inkling Small vs MiniMax-M3MiniMax · ECI 147.0
- Inkling Small vs Kimi K2.7 CodeMoonshot AI · ECI 150.0
- Inkling Small vs Gemini 3.5 Flash LiteGoogle · ECI 145.1
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash vs GLM-5.3-FlashZ.ai (Zhipu) · ECI 151.9
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash vs GPT-5.6 LunaOpenAI · ECI 156.5
- DeepSeek V4.1 Flash vs Gemini 3.6 FlashGoogle · ECI 154.3
