Beam 1.0 501B A23B vs Inkling
Updated October 21, 2026. 28 benchmarks have a result for both. Coding is ranked on the Vibe Coding Index; every other board is shown as published.
Decision reading
Pick Inkling for coding: it scores 49.7 on the Vibe Coding Index against 33.8 for Beam 1.0 501B A23B.
Pick Beam 1.0 501B A23B when output tokens cost 4.0x less, or when the context window is larger, 1.05M against 524K tokens.
- Shared results
- 28
- Beam 1.0 501B A23B only
- 0
- Inkling only
- 74
- Like-for-like categories
- 6 of 9
Shared results can support a head-to-head reading. Results only one model has describe coverage, not superiority.
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, four public coding benchmarks
Inkling
Inkling scores 49.7 against 33.8.
1 and 2 benchmarks behind the scores
Intelligence
AA Intelligence Index
No call
Only Inkling has a AA Intelligence Index result, 25.0.
Directional only
Agentic work
AA Agentic Index
No call
Only Inkling has a AA Agentic Index result, 22.5.
Directional only
Reasoning
GPQA Diamond
No call
Only Inkling has a GPQA Diamond result, 87.1%.
Directional only
Knowledge
MMLU Pro
No call
Only Inkling has a MMLU Pro result, 86.3%.
Directional only
Web design
Design Arena: websites
Beam 1.0 501B A23B
Beam 1.0 501B A23B leads, 1253 against 1224.
Same board, both measured
General
Vals Index
No call
Only Inkling has a Vals Index result, 29.0%.
Directional only
Long documents
Listed context window
Beam 1.0 501B A23B
Beam 1.0 501B A23B takes 1.05M tokens against 524K.
Listed by OpenRouter
Everyday cost
1K input + 500 output tokens
Beam 1.0 501B A23B
Beam 1.0 501B A23B $0.0008, Inkling $0.0030 per turn.
List prices
Cost per solved task
One SWE-bench Verified task, solved
No call
Only Inkling has the number, $0.76.
Directional only
At a glance
- Coding index
- Beam 1.0 501B A23B 33.8 from 1 benchmark, Inkling 49.7 from 2 benchmarks.
- Widest category
- Web design, 5.3 points apart on average over 2 shared benchmarks.
- Widest single gap
- LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare: Beam 1.0 501B A23B 1376 against Inkling 1447, 11.8 points apart on a 0 to 100 scale.
- Output price
- Beam 1.0 501B A23B $1.00 against Inkling $4.05 per million output tokens, 4.0x apart.
- Context window
- Beam 1.0 501B A23B takes 1.05M tokens, Inkling 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 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Bars | Inkling | Ties |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coding | 4 | 1 | ||
| Reasoning | 1 | 2 | ||
| Math | 1 | 1 | ||
| Knowledge | 0 | 4 | ||
| Web design | 2 | 0 | ||
| General | 4 | 8 | ||
| All shared boards | 12 | 16 |
CodingLike-for-likeFour of these boards feed the Vibe Coding Index41
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| LiveBench coding | Not measured | 64.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena WebDev | 1437 | 1414 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| AA Coding Index | Not measured | 52.1 | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 85.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| SWE-bench Verified (Vals AI) | Not measured | 77.6% | Only Inkling measured |
| Terminal-Bench 4 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 0.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| Vibe Code Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 19.2% | Only Inkling measured |
| Code migration (Vals AI) | Not measured | 11.8% | Only Inkling measured |
| ProgramBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 0.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| IOI (Vals AI) | Not measured | 14.9% | Only Inkling measured |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 47.6% | Only Inkling measured |
| Vibe Code Bench 1-100 (Vals AI) | Not measured | 7.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| SkillsBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 26.1% | Only Inkling measured |
| CyberBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 66.8% | Only Inkling measured |
| SciCode | Not measured | 47.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| FrontierCode | Not measured | 14.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| FrontierSWE | Not measured | 4.1% | Only Inkling measured |
| WeirdML | Not measured | 32.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| ALE-Bench | Not measured | 946.0 | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: coding | 1473 | 1466 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| LMArena Text: software and IT | 1461 | 1465 | Inkling |
| LMArena WebDev: React | 1443 | 1404 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| LMArena WebDev: HTML | 1436 | 1399 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| Neither model has a result on the other 15 boards here | |||
IntelligenceDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index2 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Intelligence Index | Not measured | 25.0 | Only Inkling measured |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | Not measured | 148.4 | Only Inkling measured |
Agentic workDirectional onlyPublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index12 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| AA Agentic Index | Not measured | 22.5 | Only Inkling measured |
| Design Arena: agents building web apps | Not measured | 1196 | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveBench research | Not measured | 59.9% | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveBench browser | Not measured | 16.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveBench long agentic | Not measured | 14.1% | Only Inkling measured |
| SREBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 0.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| Finance Agent (Vals AI) | Not measured | 46.6% | Only Inkling measured |
| Tax Agent Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 15.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| Legal Research Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 28.4% | Only Inkling measured |
| Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark (Vals AI) | Not measured | 3.8% | Only Inkling measured |
| Excel Modeling Benchmark (Vals AI) | Not measured | 38.4% | Only Inkling measured |
| APEX-Agents | Not measured | 33.8% | Only Inkling measured |
| Neither model has a result on the other 27 boards here | |||
ReasoningLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index12
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | Not measured | 87.1% | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveBench reasoning | Not measured | 78.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| MMMU Pro (Vals AI) | Not measured | 78.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 87.2% | Only Inkling measured |
| Humanity's Last Exam (Artificial Analysis run) | Not measured | 31.9% | Only Inkling measured |
| GPQA Diamond (Epoch AI run) | Not measured | 88.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| ARC-AGI | Not measured | 79.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| ARC-AGI-2 | Not measured | 36.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| SimpleBench | Not measured | 50.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| Chess puzzles | Not measured | 21.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts | 1442 | 1451 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: expert | 1447 | 1466 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: hard prompts in English | 1451 | 1448 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| Neither model has a result on the other 8 boards here | |||
MathLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index11
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME | Not measured | 88.9% | Only Inkling measured |
| FrontierMath, tiers 1 to 3 | Not measured | 33.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| FrontierMath, tier 4 | Not measured | 4.9% | Only Inkling measured |
| ProofBench | Not measured | 0.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: math | 1459 | 1479 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: mathematical work | 1475 | 1460 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| Neither model has a result on the other 7 boards here | |||
KnowledgeLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index04
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| MMLU Pro | Not measured | 86.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| LegalBench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 83.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| CorpFin (Vals AI) | Not measured | 68.6% | Only Inkling measured |
| TaxEval (Vals AI) | Not measured | 75.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| MortgageTax (Vals AI) | Not measured | 64.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| MedCode (Vals AI) | Not measured | 41.2% | Only Inkling measured |
| SimpleQA Verified | Not measured | 40.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: science | 1430 | 1455 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: medicine and healthcare | 1376 | 1447 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: legal and government | 1433 | 1448 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: business and finance | 1430 | 1438 | Inkling |
| Neither model has a result on the other 6 boards here | |||
Web designLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index20
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design Arena: websites | 1253 | 1224 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| Design Arena: UI components | Not measured | 1200 | Only Inkling measured |
| Design Arena: game dev | 1222 | 1166 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| Design Arena: data viz | Not measured | 1160 | Only Inkling measured |
| Design Arena: 3D | Not measured | 1161 | Only Inkling measured |
| Design Arena: all code categories | Not measured | 1206 | Only Inkling measured |
| Design Arena: SVG | Not measured | 1109 | Only Inkling measured |
| Design Arena: ASCII art | Not measured | 1089 | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveBench design | Not measured | 58.3% | Only Inkling measured |
GeneralLike-for-likePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index48
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | Leader |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vals Index | Not measured | 29.0% | Only Inkling measured |
| LiveBench data analysis | Not measured | 72.8% | Only Inkling measured |
| Public Benefits Bench (Vals AI) | Not measured | 58.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| SAGE (Vals AI) | Not measured | 36.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| MedScribe (Vals AI) | Not measured | 85.4% | Only Inkling measured |
| Vals Multimodal Index | Not measured | 49.4% | Only Inkling measured |
| Long context reasoning (AA-LCR) | Not measured | 77.3% | Only Inkling measured |
| DTBench | Not measured | 87.5% | Only Inkling measured |
| LMCA | Not measured | 37.6% | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text | 1425 | 1442 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: instruction following | 1430 | 1425 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| LMArena Text: creative writing | 1390 | 1390 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| LMArena Text: English | 1436 | 1442 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: non-English | 1413 | 1434 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: Chinese | 1424 | 1493 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: German | Not measured | 1445 | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: Japanese | Not measured | 1429 | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: Korean | Not measured | 1403 | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: French | 1461 | 1455 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| LMArena Text: Spanish | Not measured | 1449 | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: Russian | 1412 | 1430 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: Polish | Not measured | 1450 | Only Inkling measured |
| LMArena Text: multi-turn | 1414 | 1437 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: longer queries | 1429 | 1435 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: writing and language | 1400 | 1404 | Inkling |
| LMArena Text: entertainment and media | 1399 | 1394 | Beam 1.0 501B A23B |
| Neither model has a result on the other 20 boards here | |||
Image generationNot comparablePublic boards, shown as published, kept out of the index0 boards, none shared
| Benchmark | Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Inkling | 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
Beam 1.0 501B A23B costs less
Repository review
50K input + 3K output tokens
Beam 1.0 501B A23B costs less
Agent loop
200K input + 10K output tokens
Beam 1.0 501B A23B 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 | Reflection Beam 1.0 501B A23B | Thinking Machines Inkling |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | Reflection | Thinking Machines |
| Weights | Open weights | Open weights |
| Released | October 16, 2026 | July 17, 2026 |
| Context window | 1.05M | 524K |
| Input $/Mtok | $0.30 | $1.00 |
| Output $/Mtok | $1.00 | $4.05 |
| Coding index | 33.8 | 49.7 |
| Independent measurements behind it | 1 | 2 |
| Cost per solved task | Not computable | $0.76 |
| Source | OpenRouter listing | OpenRouter listing |
Questions
Is Beam 1.0 501B A23B better than Inkling for coding?
Pick Inkling for coding: it scores 49.7 on the Vibe Coding Index against 33.8 for Beam 1.0 501B A23B. Pick Beam 1.0 501B A23B when output tokens cost 4.0x less, or when the context window is larger, 1.05M against 524K tokens.
Which is cheaper, Beam 1.0 501B A23B or Inkling?
Beam 1.0 501B A23B costs $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.00 per million output tokens; Inkling costs $1.00 and $4.05. Cost per solved task is known for Inkling only.
Which has the bigger context window, Beam 1.0 501B A23B or Inkling?
Beam 1.0 501B A23B, with 1.05M tokens against 524K.
How many benchmarks is the Beam 1.0 501B A23B vs Inkling comparison based on?
28 benchmarks have a result for both models as of October 21, 2026. Beam 1.0 501B A23B's coding index rests on 1 independent benchmark and Inkling's on 2. Where only one model has a result, the page says so instead of naming a winner.