MiniMax M2.5 vs Inkling 2 Small
Inkling 2 Small leads MiniMax M2.5 on coding, 48.9 to 37.2 on the Vibe Coding Index, and Inkling 2 Small costs 1.2x less per output token ($1.00 vs $1.20 per million). Updated November 14, 2026; 25 benchmarks have a result for both.
MiniMax M2.5 or Inkling 2 Small: which to pick
Pick Inkling 2 Small for coding: it scores 48.9 on the Vibe Coding Index against 37.2 for MiniMax M2.5.
MiniMax M2.5 is neither cheaper nor larger in context, and leads no benchmark both models were measured on.
- Shared results
- 25
- MiniMax M2.5 only
- 45
- Inkling 2 Small only
- 26
- Like-for-like categories
- 4 of 9
Only benchmarks that tested both models count toward a pick; a result only one model has is shown but not compared.
Which one for your work
Each card is decided by one number both models carry. Where only one has it, the card says so and makes no call.
Coding
Vibe Coding Index, six public coding benchmarks
Inkling 2 Small
Inkling 2 Small scores 48.9 against 37.2.
3 benchmarks behind each score
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
No call
Only Inkling 2 Small has a AA Intelligence Index result, 30.6.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only MiniMax M2.5 has a GPQA Diamond result, 82.1%.
Directional only
Math
AIME
No call
Only MiniMax M2.5 has a AIME result, 88.8%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only MiniMax M2.5 has a MMLU Pro result, 80.1%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
No call
Only MiniMax M2.5 has a Design Arena: websites result, 1214.
Directional only
General
Vals Index
No call
Only Inkling 2 Small has a Vals Index result, 56.1%.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Inkling 2 Small
Inkling 2 Small takes 1.05M tokens against 198K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Inkling 2 Small
MiniMax M2.5 $0.0009, Inkling 2 Small $0.0008 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
No call
Only MiniMax M2.5 has the number, $0.62.
Directional only
At a glance
- Coding index
- MiniMax M2.5 37.2 from 3 benchmarks, Inkling 2 Small 48.9 from 3 benchmarks.
- Widest category
- Coding, 32.5 points apart on average over 6 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- ARC-AGI-2: MiniMax M2.5 4.9% against Inkling 2 Small 81.7%, 76.8 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- MiniMax M2.5 $1.20 against Inkling 2 Small $1.00 per million output tokens, 1.2x apart.
- Context window
- MiniMax M2.5 takes 198K tokens, Inkling 2 Small 1.05M.
Benchmark by benchmark
First the score: boards each model leads, per category, where both have a result. Then every board, a category to a fold; bars are each result on a 0 to 100 scale, so compare the two in a row, not one row with another.
| Category | MiniMax M2.5 | Bars | Inkling 2 Small | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 0 | 6 | ||
| Reasoning | 0 | 6 | ||
| Knowledge | 0 | 2 | ||
| General | 0 | 11 | ||
| All shared boards | 0 | 25 |
CodingLike-for-likeSix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index06
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE-bench Verified | 75.8% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| SWE-bench Multilingual | 68.3% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1386 | 1647 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | 79.2% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | 74.2% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 12.6% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | 14.8% | 81.5% | Inkling 2 Small |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 0.5% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| SWE-bench Multimodal (Vals AI) | Not measured | 43.1% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 72.7% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| SciCode | Not measured | 52.3% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | 34.8% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Terminal-Bench 4.0 (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 13.1% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| FrontierCode 2.0 | Not measured | 25.4% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Terminal-Bench | 42.7% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| ALE-Bench | 618.2 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1381 | 1455 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1383 | 1443 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1373 | 1660 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1414 | 1661 | Inkling 2 Small |
| SWE-Bench Pro V2 | Not measured | 97.7% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| SWE Atlas: Codebase QnA | 10.3% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| SWE Atlas: Refactoring | 19.5% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| SWE Atlas: Test Writing | 18.6% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.0 | 42.7% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 27 boards here | |||
IntelligenceDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index1 board, none shared
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | Not measured | 30.6 | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 1 board here | |||
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index11 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SREBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 1.9% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 38.9% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 46.6% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark (Vals AI) | Not measured | 21.7% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| BioMysteryBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 70.0% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Terminal-Bench-Science (Vals AI) | Not measured | 2.9% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Vals Science Index | Not measured | 32.7% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | 95.3% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| APEX-Agents | Not measured | 46.8% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Vending-Bench 2 | -$23 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| MCP Atlas | Not measured | 85.4% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 33 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index06
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 82.1% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| MysteryMechanism (Vals AI) | Not measured | 25.2% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 84.8% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 20.5% | 44.1% | Inkling 2 Small |
| HLE-Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 28.7% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| CritPt v2, hard subset (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 35.0% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| ARC-AGI | 63.7% | 96.5% | Inkling 2 Small |
| ARC-AGI-2 | 4.9% | 81.7% | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1372 | 1421 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1380 | 1478 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1384 | 1424 | Inkling 2 Small |
| Kagi LLM Benchmark | 55.2% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 14 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index5 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AIME | 88.8% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| ProofBench | 4.0% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1377 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1380 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| MathArena | Not measured | 42.4% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 9 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index02
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | 80.1% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | 80.0% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| CaseLaw (Vals AI) | 53.5% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | 59.6% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | 68.2% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| MedQA (Vals AI) | 92.5% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| AA-Omniscience | Not measured | 16.1 | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1370 | 1409 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1358 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1366 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1356 | 1415 | Inkling 2 Small |
| Neither model has a result on the other 10 boards here | |||
Web designDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index7 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1214 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1163 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1166 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1168 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Design Arena: 3D | 1149 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Design Arena: all code categories | 1196 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Design Arena: SVG | 1138 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 2 boards here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index011
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vals Index | Not measured | 56.1% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | Not measured | 88.6% | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| IFBench | 71.6% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 73.3% | 83.3% | Inkling 2 Small |
| GDPval-AA | Not measured | 1630 | Only Inkling 2 Small measured |
| CL-bench | 11.4% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| CL-bench Life | 6.3% | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text | 1359 | 1403 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1353 | 1408 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1330 | 1348 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: English | 1380 | 1418 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1338 | 1390 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1393 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: German | 1362 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | 1169 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | 1233 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: French | 1364 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | 1354 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1360 | 1377 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: Polish | 1334 | Not measured | Only MiniMax M2.5 measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1364 | 1408 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1366 | 1403 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1345 | 1381 | Inkling 2 Small |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1329 | 1359 | Inkling 2 Small |
| Neither model has a result on the other 25 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | MiniMax M2.5 | Inkling 2 Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Neither model has a result on 5 boards here | |||
What each workload costs
Three fixed token mixes at each model's listed price, so per-token rates become a bill.
Chat turn
1K input + 500 output tokens
Inkling 2 Small costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Inkling 2 Small costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Inkling 2 Small costs less
Listed OpenRouter rates, without cache or batch discounts. A workload that does not fit a model's context window would need splitting.
Specification differences
The leading value in a row is marked; a row with a missing value names no leader. Our two rows are marked in red.
| Specification | MiniMax M2.5 | Thinking Machines Inkling 2 Small |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | MiniMax | Thinking Machines |
| Weights | Open weights | Open weights |
| Released | February 12, 2026 | November 9, 2026 |
| Context window | 198K | 1.05M |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.2975 | $0.30 |
| Output $/Mtok | $1.20 | $1.00 |
| Coding index | 37.2 | 48.9 |
| Independent measurements behind it | 3 | 3 |
| Cost per solved task | $0.62 | Not computable |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is MiniMax M2.5 better than Inkling 2 Small for coding?
Pick Inkling 2 Small for coding: it scores 48.9 on the Vibe Coding Index against 37.2 for MiniMax M2.5. MiniMax M2.5 is neither cheaper nor larger in context, and leads no benchmark both models were measured on.
Which is cheaper, MiniMax M2.5 or Inkling 2 Small?
MiniMax M2.5 costs $0.2975 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens; Inkling 2 Small costs $0.30 and $1.00. Cost per solved task is known for MiniMax M2.5 only.
Which has the bigger context window, MiniMax M2.5 or Inkling 2 Small?
Inkling 2 Small, with 1.05M tokens against 198K.
How many benchmarks is the MiniMax M2.5 vs Inkling 2 Small comparison based on?
25 benchmarks have a result for both models as of November 14, 2026. MiniMax M2.5's coding index rests on 3 independent benchmarks and Inkling 2 Small's on 3. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.