Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct vs Inkling Small
Inkling Small leads Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index, 25.7 to 9.6, and Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct costs 2.7x less per output token ($0.44 vs $1.20 per million). Updated October 21, 2026; 4 benchmarks have a result for both.
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct or Inkling Small: which to pick
Only Inkling Small has a coding score, 27.3 on the Vibe Coding Index; Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding.
Pick Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct for output tokens 2.7x cheaper ($0.44 vs $1.20 per million).
- Shared results
- 4
- Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct only
- 12
- Inkling Small only
- 80
- Like-for-like categories
- 3 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
No call
Only Inkling Small has a coding score, so no call is made.
One side not measured
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
Inkling Small
Inkling Small leads, 25.7 against 9.6.
Same board, both measured
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only Inkling Small has a AA Agentic Index result, 23.5.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only Inkling Small has a GPQA Diamond result, 83.6%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only Inkling Small has a MMLU Pro result, 85.6%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
No call
Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct has a Design Arena: websites result, 1087.
Directional only
General
Vals Index
No call
Only Inkling Small has a Vals Index result, 27.6%.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Inkling Small
Inkling Small takes 524K tokens against 262K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct $0.0003, Inkling Small $0.0010 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
No call
Only Inkling Small has the number, $0.16.
Directional only
At a glance
- Coding index
- Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct not benchmarked, Inkling Small 27.3 from 4 benchmarks.
- Widest category
- General, 43.0 points apart on average over 1 shared benchmark.
- Widest single gap
- Long context reasoning (AA-LCR): Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct 32.7% against Inkling Small 75.7%, 43.0 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct $0.44 against Inkling Small $1.20 per million output tokens, 2.7x apart.
- Context window
- Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct takes 262K tokens, Inkling Small 524K.
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 | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Bars | Inkling Small | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence | 0 | 1 | ||
| Reasoning | 0 | 2 | ||
| General | 0 | 1 | ||
| All shared boards | 0 | 4 |
CodingDirectional onlySix of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index22 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| SWE-bench Verified | 60.4% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| SWE-bench Lite | 49.7% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| LMArena WebDev | Not measured | 1409 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| AA Coding Index | Not measured | 52.9 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 85.9% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | Not measured | 82.2% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 0.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 19.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | Not measured | 13.7% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 0.5% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| IOI (Vals AI) | Not measured | 9.3% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 55.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| SkillsBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 33.6% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 64.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Artificial Analysis run) | 40.3% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| SciCode | Not measured | 49.7% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Terminal-Bench Hard (Artificial Analysis run) | 15.2% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | Not measured | 1450 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | Not measured | 1447 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena WebDev: React | Not measured | 1399 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | Not measured | 1398 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena WebDev: from an image | Not measured | 1410 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 17 boards here | |||
IntelligenceLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index01
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | 9.6 | 25.7 | Inkling Small |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | Not measured | 150.3 | Only Inkling Small measured |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index7 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | Not measured | 23.5 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | Not measured | 41.3% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 15.4% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 25.5% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark (Vals AI) | Not measured | 2.9% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | Not measured | 31.8% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| τ²-Bench Telecom | 34.5% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 34 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index02
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | Not measured | 83.6% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | 51.6% | 89.5% | Inkling Small |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | 3.8% | 33.3% | Inkling Small |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | Not measured | 88.5% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| ARC-AGI | Not measured | 84.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | Not measured | 40.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Mystery game puzzles | Not measured | 6.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | Not measured | 1423 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: expert | Not measured | 1441 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | Not measured | 1429 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: diagrams | Not measured | 1251 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: homework | Not measured | 1257 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 10 boards here | |||
MathDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index8 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Math Index | 29.0 | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| AIME 2025 (Artificial Analysis run) | 29.0% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| OTIS Mock AIME | Not measured | 90.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | Not measured | 46.3% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | Not measured | 17.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| ProofBench | Not measured | 6.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: math | Not measured | 1459 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | Not measured | 1441 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 5 boards here | |||
KnowledgeDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index12 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | Not measured | 85.6% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 83.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | Not measured | 69.6% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | Not measured | 75.5% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | Not measured | 62.3% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | Not measured | 37.9% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| MMLU Pro (Artificial Analysis run) | 70.6% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | Not measured | 19.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: science | Not measured | 1428 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | Not measured | 1413 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | Not measured | 1415 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | Not measured | 1413 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 6 boards here | |||
Web designDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index3 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1087 | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| Design Arena: UI components | 1046 | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| Design Arena: data viz | 1085 | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 6 boards here | |||
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index01
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling Small | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vals Index | Not measured | 27.6% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 59.4% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | Not measured | 32.7% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | Not measured | 84.1% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Vals Multimodal Index | Not measured | 50.0% | Only Inkling Small measured |
| IFBench | 32.7% | Not measured | Only Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | 32.7% | 75.7% | Inkling Small |
| LMArena Text | Not measured | 1413 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | Not measured | 1399 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | Not measured | 1334 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision | Not measured | 1237 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: English | Not measured | 1421 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: non-English | Not measured | 1401 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | Not measured | 1464 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: German | Not measured | 1408 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | Not measured | 1401 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | Not measured | 1367 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: French | Not measured | 1435 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | Not measured | 1422 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | Not measured | 1394 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: Polish | Not measured | 1428 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | Not measured | 1416 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | Not measured | 1402 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | Not measured | 1357 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | Not measured | 1352 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: English | Not measured | 1243 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: Chinese | Not measured | 1292 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: reading text | Not measured | 1243 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: humor | Not measured | 1207 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| LMArena Vision: creative writing | Not measured | 1205 | Only Inkling Small measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 16 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Inkling 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
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct 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 | Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct | Thinking Machines Inkling Small |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Qwen | Thinking Machines |
| Weights | Open weights | Open weights |
| Released | July 31, 2025 | July 30, 2026 |
| Context window | 262K | 524K |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.11 | $0.45 |
| Output $/Mtok | $0.44 | $1.20 |
| Coding index | Not benchmarked | 27.3 |
| Independent measurements behind it | 0 | 4 |
| Cost per solved task | Not computable | $0.16 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct better than Inkling Small for coding?
Only Inkling Small has a coding score, 27.3 on the Vibe Coding Index; Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct has none, so the two cannot be ranked on coding. Pick Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct for output tokens 2.7x cheaper ($0.44 vs $1.20 per million).
Which is cheaper, Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct or Inkling Small?
Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct costs $0.11 per million input tokens and $0.44 per million output tokens; Inkling Small costs $0.45 and $1.20. Cost per solved task is known for Inkling Small only.
Which has the bigger context window, Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct or Inkling Small?
Inkling Small, with 524K tokens against 262K.
How many benchmarks is the Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct vs Inkling Small comparison based on?
4 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 21, 2026. Qwen3 Coder 30B A3B Instruct's coding index rests on 0 independent benchmarks and Inkling Small's on 4. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.