# Inkling vs Step 5 Preview

> Side-by-side benchmark comparison for Inkling and Step 5 Preview across agentic, coding, multimodal, knowledge, reasoning, multilingual, and math tasks.

- Canonical page: https://benchlm.ai/compare/inkling-vs-step-5-preview
- Last updated: September 21, 2026

- Shared sourced benchmarks: 5
- HTML indexing: indexable
- Ranking lane: BenchAlign v5

## Quick Verdict

Pick Step 5 Preview if you want the stronger benchmark profile. Inkling only makes more sense when its price, context window, or workload-specific category wins matter more than the overall score.

## Summary

- Step 5 Preview leads overall 72 to 60.27.
- The clearest category separation is in multimodal & grounded, where the averages are 48.8 for Inkling and 61.2 for Step 5 Preview.
- The biggest single benchmark swing is BrowseComp in Agentic, with scores of 77.1% and 88.7%.
- Step 5 Preview is the cheaper option on output tokens, which matters if you expect large responses or heavy interactive use.

## Model Snapshot

| Property | Inkling | Step 5 Preview |
|----------|----------|----------|
| Creator | Thinking Machines Lab | StepFun |
| Type | Open Weight | Pending |
| Reasoning | Hybrid | Reasoning |
| Context | 1M | 1M |
| Overall Score | 60.27 | null |
| Benchmarks Covered | 21 | 22 |
| Pricing (input/output) | $1.87 / $4.68 | $1.00 / $2.70 |

## Category Breakdown

### Agentic

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 38.8 (Supported · #125/154)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| Terminal-Bench 2.0 | 63.8% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| BrowseComp | 77.1% | 88.7% | Step 5 Preview |
| MCP Atlas | 74.1% | 85.6% | Step 5 Preview |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 (Vals) | 47.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | Coming soon | 85.0% | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 4.0 | Coming soon | 33.30% | Coming soon |
| CyberGym | Coming soon | 84.7% | Coming soon |
| AutomationBench | Coming soon | 44.0% | Coming soon |
| Toolathlon-Verified | Coming soon | 74.1% | Coming soon |
| JobBench | Coming soon | 59.0% | Coming soon |
| APEX-Agents | Coming soon | 37.8% | Coming soon |
| DRACO | Coming soon | 83.3% | Coming soon |
| Agents' Last Exam | Coming soon | 29.5% | Coming soon |

### Coding

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 41.8 (Supported · #111/156)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| SWE-bench Verified | 77.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE-bench Pro | 54.3% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.0 | 63.8% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| FrontierSWE v2 | 4.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| LiveCodeBench (Vals) | 85.5% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| SWE-bench (Vals) | 77.6% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| DeepSWE | Coming soon | 67.7% | Coming soon |
| Terminal-Bench 2.1 | Coming soon | 85.0% | Coming soon |
| SciCode | Coming soon | 58.9% | Coming soon |
| ProgramBench | Coming soon | 80.5% | Coming soon |
| sweMarathon | Coming soon | 72.7% | Coming soon |
| MLS-Bench Lite | Coming soon | 40.5% | Coming soon |

### Reasoning

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 74.1 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: 78.5 (Unranked · 2 rankable rows)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| CritPt | Coming soon | 20.9% | Coming soon |

### Multimodal & Grounded

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 48.8 (#39/49)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: 61.2 (#28/49)

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| MMMU-Pro | 73.5% | 76% | Step 5 Preview |
| CharXiv | 82% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| CharXiv w/o tools | 78.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| OfficeQA Pro | Coming soon | 60.3% | Coming soon |

### Knowledge

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 57.4 (Supported · #43/186)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| GPQA | 87.9% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| GPQA-D | 87.9% | 93.5% | Step 5 Preview |
| HLE | 46% | 46.5% | Step 5 Preview |
| HLE w/o tools | 30% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| GPQA Diamond (Vals) | 87.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |
| MMLU-Pro (Vals) | 86.3% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

### Instruction Following

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 83.9 (#44/124)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| IFBench | 79.8% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

### Mathematics

- Winner: Coming soon
- Inkling public-lane score: 78.5 (Unranked · 1 rankable row)
- Step 5 Preview public-lane score: Coming soon

| Benchmark | Inkling | Step 5 Preview | Winner |
|-----------|-----------|-----------|--------|
| AIME26 | 97.1% | Coming soon | Coming soon |

## FAQ

### Which is better overall, Inkling or Step 5 Preview?

Step 5 Preview is ahead overall on BenchLM right now.

### Where is the biggest gap between Inkling and Step 5 Preview?

The widest category gap is in multimodal & grounded, where the averages are 48.8 for Inkling and 61.2 for Step 5 Preview.

### How many benchmarks does Inkling cover on BenchLM?

Inkling currently has 21 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

### How many benchmarks does Step 5 Preview cover on BenchLM?

Step 5 Preview currently has 22 sourced benchmark scores on BenchLM.

## Related Comparisons

- [Inkling vs Inkling-Small](/compare/inkling-vs-inkling-small)
- [Step 5 Preview vs Inkling-Small](/compare/inkling-small-vs-step-5-preview)
- [Inkling vs Claude Fable 5.1](/compare/claude-fable-5-1-vs-inkling)
- [Step 5 Preview vs Claude Fable 5.1](/compare/claude-fable-5-1-vs-step-5-preview)

## Explore More

- [Inkling profile](/models/inkling)
- [Step 5 Preview profile](/models/step-5-preview)
- [Compare Pricing](/llm-pricing)
- [Alternative Finder](/tools/alternative-finder)
- [LLM Selector](/tools/llm-selector)
- [Overall Rankings](/best/overall)