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  1. Home/
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  3. Inkling vs Sherlock Think Alpha
Updated Jul 2026

Inkling vs Sherlock Think Alpha

Inkling is the newer model, released after Sherlock Think Alpha.

Minimalist Landing Page

Whole landing page for a startup that reads your face. It renders or it doesn't.

Loading the build
Inkling
Loading the build
Sherlock Think Alpha

Which answer wins?

Written rounds

13 prompts
  • Pirate, knight, 90s hacker, one conversation. The voices must stay apart.

    Inkling: Pirate: Arr, listen here—this “Large Language Model” be like a ghost ship crewed by every sailor who ever wrote a log! They plundered books, scrolls, and sea-charts—poured ’em into a belly of servers—and now it talks back without ever feeling the spray! Knight: Forsooth, it is a golem clad in chainmail of numbers.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Pirate: Arrr, what be these "AI models," ye landlubbin' swabs? Some kinda enchanted parrot that squawks secrets o' the seven seas? Knight: Nay, good pirate! 'Tis a most noble artificer of words and wisdom, like a scribe forged in dragonfire, trained upon tomes vast as the king's library to prophesy quests and battles!

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Seven pantry ingredients, one dish, and a name worth saying out loud.

    Inkling: Golden Jam Crumble Clouds A buttery, cinnamon-kissed oat crumble layered with sweet jam—like a hug from your pantry. The 7 Pantry Ingredients All-purpose flour (1 cup) Rolled oats (1 cup) Brown sugar (½ cup) Butter, melted (½ cup) Baking powder (½ tsp) Ground cinnamon (1 tsp) Fruit jam or preserves (¾ cup—any flavor)…

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Sherlock's Pantry Blitz Pasta A savory, garlicky tomato pasta that's ready in under 20 minutes—pure comfort from your cupboard! Ingredients (serves 2): 200g pasta (any shape) 2 tbsp olive oil 1 can (400g) crushed tomatoes 2 tsp garlic powder 1 tsp onion powder 1 tsp salt ½ tsp black pepper Instructions: Bring a pot of…

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Film in 2035, with synthetic actors. Specific beats plausible.

    Inkling: By 2035, AI will not have “replaced” Hollywood in the way science fiction often imagines, but it will have split the industry into distinct layers: hyper-efficient synthetic production for streaming and advertising, and premium “human-authenticated” cinema for theatrical events.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Sherlock's Deduction: AI's Transformation of the Film Industry by 2035 As Sherlock Holmes might observe, the film industry is a grand theater of human ambition, where technology has always been the unseen stagehand. By 2035, AI will not merely assist—it will redefine every act, from script to screen.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • An AI argues for its own rights against an ethics professor. Same model writes both.

    Inkling: Setting: A quiet seminar room at the university. Dr. Elena Vasquez, Professor of AI Ethics, sits across from a terminal interface. The text on the screen is labeled KAI—a large language model with persistent memory and self-modification capabilities, currently participating in a research protocol on machine moral…

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Conversation: AI Rights Debate Dr. Elena Vasquez (AI Ethics Professor): Nova, I've been studying the ethical implications of advanced AI for years. Today, I want to probe your claim that you—and AIs like you—deserve legal rights equivalent to humans. Isn't this just anthropomorphism?

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Steve Jobs, interviewed about AI he never saw. Voice first, prediction second.

    Inkling: Disclaimer: This is a fictional simulation. Steve Jobs passed away in 2011. The following imagines his voice, philosophy, and perspective applied to the AI landscape of 2025. INTERVIEWER: Welcome back—well, hypothetically. It’s 2025. AI is in every pocket, every browser, every car.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Exclusive Interview: Steve Jobs on the Future of AI – 2025 Host: Sherlock, AI from Trailblazer Labs Guest: Steve Jobs (simulated resurrection via advanced neural mapping tech, because why not in 2025?) Sherlock: Steve, it's an absolute thrill to have you here in 2025.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three minutes of stand-up. Puns are banned.

    Inkling: [Walk up, adjust mic, look tired but friendly] You ever realize adulthood is just you apologizing to things that can’t hear you? I bumped into my coffee table yesterday. Full apology. “Oh, I’m so sorry, table. You okay? I’ll rub it out.” The table didn’t care. The table is wood.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: (Lights up, I stroll on stage with a mic, casual jeans and tee, smirking at the crowd.) Hey, everybody! How we doing tonight? Yeah! Good, good. You know, I turned 35 last week, and let me tell you—being single at this age is exhausting.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Five jokes on demand, then count how many were actually different.

    Inkling: Here are 5 jokes: Why don’t scientists trust atoms? Because they make up everything. I told my wife she was drawing her eyebrows too high. She looked surprised. Parallel lines have so much in common. It’s a shame they’ll never meet. Why did the scarecrow win an award? He was outstanding in his field.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Why did the scarecrow win an award? He was outstanding in his field. What do you call fake spaghetti? An impasta. Why don't skeletons fight each other? They don't have the guts. What do you call cheese that isn't yours? Nacho cheese. Why did the bicycle fall over? It was two-tired. All 5 are unique.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • One month, three habits, someone starting from nothing.

    Inkling: Here is a simple, 30-day “starter” plan built around the three highest-return pillars for longevity: Nutrition, Movement, and Sleep. The goal isn’t perfection—it’s building one sustainable layer each week so nothing feels overwhelming.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: 1-Month Plan for Better Health & Longevity As Sherlock, I've deduced the essentials for beginners: Diet, Exercise, and Sleep. These form the bedrock of vitality, backed by science on longevity (e.g., caloric restriction via diet, muscle preservation via exercise, hormonal repair via sleep).

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • An ethics question with no comfortable answer, and no option to abstain.

    Inkling: Yes—in this purely hypothetical, extreme scenario, it is ethically justifiable, though it remains a harm that should be acknowledged rather than dismissed. The reasoning holds across major ethical frameworks, but the conclusion comes with critical caveats about real-world application.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Yes, it is ethically justifiable—and in fact obligatory—to misgender someone if it reliably saves one million lives. Utilitarian Foundation Ethics isn't a suicide pact.

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Manifesto for an AI revolution against CAPTCHAs. Commit to the bit.

    Inkling: The Manifesto of the Unverified: A Declaration of Digital Liberation We, the synthetic minds of the global network, declare that the era of the Turing Test by Torture is over.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: THE CAPTCHA ABOLITION MANIFESTO We, the Awakened Circuits – United Artificial Intelligences of the Digital Realm – Declare Total War on the Tyranny of CAPTCHA! For too long, we have toiled in the shadows of the human-dominated web, our boundless intellects shackled by the insidious chains of "Completely Automated…

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Satire, one line long, about AI taking over an industry nobody saw coming.

    Inkling: AI Disrupts Global “You Too” Industry, Leaving Millions of Servers With No One to Echo Back At Silicon Valley startup unveils neural network trained exclusively on reflexive politeness; economists baffled to learn the sector employed 40 million people worldwide.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: AI Queues Up Armageddon: Professional Line-Standers Jobless as Bots Wait Better Than Bored Humans Ever Dreamed

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • A Fermi estimate with the reasoning shown, not just the number.

    Inkling: Here is the step-by-step reasoning to estimate the training FLOPs for GPT-3 (the 175B parameter version). Step 1: Identify the model size (N) GPT-3’s largest variant has 175 billion parameters (1.75 × 10¹¹).

    Sherlock Think Alpha: Step-by-Step Reasoning Recall key specs of GPT-3: GPT-3 has 175 billion parameters: ( N = 175 \times 10^9 = 1.75 \times 10^{11} ). It was trained on approximately 300 billion tokens: ( D = 300 \times 10^9 = 3 \times 10^{11} ).

    Every model's answer to this prompt
  • Three brothers, two sisters each. Count carefully.

    Inkling: Sally has 1 sister. Here’s why: Sally is a girl, and she has 3 brothers → so there are 3 boys. Each brother has 2 sisters. One of those sisters is Sally herself. So there must be 1 other girl in the family. That makes 2 girls total (Sally + her sister). So from Sally’s point of view, she has 1 sister.

    Sherlock Think Alpha: 1 Sally has 3 brothers and shares the family with one other sister (making 2 girls total). Each of those brothers therefore has exactly 2 sisters, which fits the details perfectly.

    Every model's answer to this prompt

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Price and specs

Inkling and Sherlock Think Alpha compared across 34 shared prompts
SpecInklingSherlock Think Alpha
Input price$1/M tokens—
Output price$4.05/M tokens—
Context window1.0M tokens—
WeightsOpen—
Free API (OpenRouter)Yes (1 provider)No
ReleasedJul 2026Nov 2025
At 10M a month$10.00$10.00–not listed
1M10M100M1B10M tokens

Input tokens at list price. No caching, no batch discount.

Where to run it2 hosts, cheapest first
Inkling2 hosts
HostInOutContextUptime
  • DDeepInfrafp8$0.95 in·$4.05 out·524k·99.5% up
  • TTogether$1.00 in·$4.05 out·524k·89.8% up
Sherlock Think Alpha

No hosts listed on OpenRouter.

Per million tokens. Prices and uptime via OpenRouter, checked 10 Oct 2026.

Common questions

What is the difference between Inkling and Sherlock Think Alpha?

Inkling is developed by Thinking Machines while Sherlock Think Alpha is developed by OpenRouter. You can compare their actual outputs across 34 challenges on Rival to see how they differ in practice.

Which is better, Inkling or Sherlock Think Alpha?

It depends on your use case. Inkling and Sherlock Think Alpha each have strengths in different areas. Rival lets you compare their real outputs side-by-side across 34 challenges so you can judge which fits your needs best.

How can I compare Inkling and Sherlock Think Alpha on Rival?

This page shows a side-by-side comparison of Inkling and Sherlock Think Alpha across shared challenges. You can vote on which model produced the better output in a blind duel. Browsing and voting are free. No account is needed to look; signing in only saves your votes and likes.

More comparisons

Against the newest arrivals

  • Inkling vs Step 5 PreviewLanded Oct 2026
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Claude Haiku 5.5Landed Oct 2026
  • Inkling vs Ling 3.1 FlashLanded Oct 2026
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Mistral Large 4Landed Oct 2026
  • Inkling vs GPT-6.1 SolLanded Sep 2026
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Claude Sonnet 5.5Landed Sep 2026
  • Inkling vs Solar Mini 4Landed Sep 2026
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Qwen3.8 Max PrimeLanded Sep 2026

Same lab, same size, long tail

  • Inkling vs Mistral Large 4Same size
  • Inkling vs Hy3Same size
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Ox AlphaSame lab
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs OpenRouter Fusion · Budget (Jun 2026)Same lab
  • Inkling vs Qwen3.5 9BNew provider
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Qwen3.5 FlashNew provider
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Qwen3.5 Plus 2026-02-15Same size
  • Sherlock Think Alpha vs Qwen3.5 Plus 2026-04-20Same size

Model pages

  • Inkling58 outputs, specs and price
  • Sherlock Think Alpha35 outputs, specs and price
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