Inkling-Small vs Sakana Namazu: Specs & Benchmark Comparison

Inkling-Small is developed by Thinking Machines Lab, while Sakana Namazu comes from Sakana AI. Inkling-Small was released in July 2026, and Sakana Namazu followed a month later in August 2026. Inkling-Small has a published size of about 276 billion parameters; Sakana AI has not disclosed the parameter count of Sakana Namazu.

We have 24 benchmark results for Inkling-Small and 3 benchmark results for Sakana Namazu, but they overlap on a single test: AIME 2026, where Sakana Namazu scores 96.7% against 95.5%.

Inkling-Small is the cheaper API at $0.30 per million input tokens and $1.20 per million output tokens, roughly 3 times cheaper than Sakana Namazu at $0.95 and $4. Both accept a context window of about 256K tokens. Inkling-Small accepts text, images, and audio as input, while Sakana Namazu accepts text and images.

CharacteristicInkling-SmallSakana Namazu
CompanyThinking Machines LabSakana AI
Release DateJuly 30, 2026August 3, 2026
Parameters276B
MultimodalYesYes
Context (input)256K256K
Context (output)256K256K
Input Price / 1M$0.30$0.95
Output Price / 1M$1.20$4.00
Average Score60.3%92.4%
Benchmarks
AIME 202695.5%96.7%

Visual Benchmark Comparison

Inkling-Small
Sakana Namazu
AIME 20261.0 vs 1.0
1.0
1.0

Verdict

Inkling-Small leads in 1 out of 4 comparison categories.

Overall Performance

Both models show comparable average scores: Inkling-Small — 0.6, Sakana Namazu — 0.9.

API Cost

Inkling-Small is 3.3x cheaper: input $0.30/1M vs $0.95/1M tokens.

Context Window

Same context size: 256K tokens.

Recency

Both models were released around the same time: 7/30/2026 and 8/3/2026.

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Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better for coding — Inkling-Small or Sakana Namazu?
Direct comparison on the SWE-Bench benchmark is not available. We recommend reviewing other metrics on the comparison page.
Which model is cheaper — Inkling-Small or Sakana Namazu?
Inkling-Small is cheaper for input: $0.30 per 1M tokens vs $0.95.
Which has a larger context window — Inkling-Small or Sakana Namazu?
Inkling-Small supports a larger context: 256,000 tokens vs 256,000.

The Inkling-Small and Sakana Namazu comparison is updated for 2026. Data includes benchmark results, API pricing, context window size and other specifications. For more detailed information, visit the Inkling-Small or Sakana Namazu page. See also the complete list of AI model comparisons.