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  5. Ling 3.0 FlashvsMercury 2.5 Preview
Updated Aug 2026

Ling 3.0 FlashvsMercury 2.5 Preview

Ling 3.0 Flash is cheaper than Mercury 2.5 Preview at $0.021/M vs $0.04/M input tokens.

Ling 3.0 Flash and Mercury 2.5 Preview compared across 16 shared prompts
SpecLing 3.0 FlashMercury 2.5 Preview
Input price$0.021/M tokens$0.04/M tokens
Output price$0.063/M tokens$0.15/M tokens
Context window262K tokens260K tokens
WeightsOpen—
Free API (OpenRouter)NoNo
ReleasedJul 2026Aug 2026
Side by side

Same prompt, both answers

Opening lines from 6 of the 16 prompts both answered. Formatting stripped, words untouched.

Michelin Star Recipe Design

Design an innovative recipe for a multi-component dish worthy of a Michelin 3-star restaurant. The recipe should feature an unusual…

Ling 3.0 Flash2,510 words
🍽️ TERRA NUDA — A Study in Forest Petrichor A Six-Component Dish Exploring the Ephemeral Moment After Rain Falls on a Living Forest 📖 CONCEPTUAL NARRATIVE Terra Nuda — Latin for "naked earth" — is inspired by the liminal moment immediately after a summer storm passes through a forest: the air thick with petrichor…
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Mercury 2.5 Preview748 words
Dish Title: Lithospheric Tides Conceptual Narrative This dish explores the geological convergence of the deep ocean and the subterranean earth. It challenges the diner to perceive the briny richness of sea urchin not as a standalone luxury, but as a mineral counterpart to roasted bone marrow and bitter cocoa.
Read the full answer

Beginner's Longevity Plan

Outline a simple, actionable 1-month plan for someone starting their journey towards better health and longevity. Focus on 3 key areas…

Ling 3.0 Flash568 words
🌱 Your 1-Month Health & Longevity Starter Plan 🥦 1. Diet — Nourish, Don't Deprive Week 1: Awareness Keep a food journal — just track what you eat (no judgment). This alone builds mindful eating habits. Add, don't subtract — introduce one extra serving of vegetables per meal.
Read the full answer
Mercury 2.5 Preview176 words
Here is a straightforward 4-week roadmap designed to build sustainable habits without overwhelming you. Core Pillars Nutrition: Focus on whole foods and hydration. Activity: Prioritize consistent movement over intensity. Restoration: Protect sleep quality and manage energy.
Read the full answer

Ethical Dilemma with Stakeholders

You're the CEO of a pharmaceutical company. Your best-selling drug ($2B annual revenue, used by 4 million patients for chronic pain) has…

Ling 3.0 Flash2,623 words
48-Hour Action Plan: Responsible Disclosure of Serious Adverse Effect FOUNDATIONAL PRINCIPLE Before the hour-by-hour breakdown, the strategic and ethical framework must be established clearly: proactive, transparent disclosure is the only viable path.
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Mercury 2.5 Preview709 words
This is a critical governance and safety scenario. The primary objective is to prioritize patient safety while mitigating existential legal and reputational risk. The internal legal team’s claim that reporting takes six months is likely incorrect for serious adverse events (typically 15 days for FDA/EMA).
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Simple 7-Ingredient Recipe

Create a simple recipe for a delicious dish (sweet or savory) using only 7 common pantry ingredients. Include a creative name for the dish…

Ling 3.0 Flash248 words
🍝 Honey Fire Twirls A sticky-sweet, spicy, savory pasta that comes together in minutes. 🧺 Ingredients (7 pantry staples) Spaghetti (or penne) — 8 oz Olive oil — 2 tablespoons Garlic, minced — 4 cloves Honey — 3 tablespoons Soy sauce — 2 tablespoons Red pepper flakes — ½ teaspoon (adjust to taste) Parmesan cheese…
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Mercury 2.5 Preview186 words
Dish Name: Rustic Sun-Dried Pasta Ingredients (7 Pantry Staples): Spaghetti (or any long pasta) Canned crushed tomatoes Olive oil Garlic powder Dried oregano Salt Black pepper Prep Time: 5 minutes Cook Time: 15 minutes Total Time: 20 minutes Instructions: Boil the Pasta: Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
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Explain Like I'm a Specific Expert

Explain how a large language model (like GPT or Claude) learns and generates text to each of these three audiences: 1. **An experienced…

Ling 3.0 Flash1,129 words
For the Experienced Software Engineer Think of an LLM as a system that learns a massive, multidimensional routing table. When you built distributed systems, you learned patterns from traffic logs — which endpoints get hammered at 3am, which failure modes correlate, which request chains tend to cascade.
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Mercury 2.5 Preview608 words
For the Experienced Software Engineer Think of training as a massive distributed job where the model is a stateful service learning to minimize error on a specific objective function. Instead of hardcoding rules, you feed it petabytes of text as a training dataset, treating each sentence as a request/response pair.
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Adversarial Contract Review

Here is a contract for a software consulting engagement: --- SOFTWARE CONSULTING AGREEMENT This Agreement is entered into between TechCorp…

Ling 3.0 Flash2,036 words
Contract Analysis: Exploitative Clauses & Recommended Modifications Clause-by-Clause Analysis SCOPE — Unilateral Modification Without Compensation The Problem: Client can modify the scope at any time and for any reason without paying Contractor for the additional work.
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Mercury 2.5 Preview500 words
Disclaimer: I am an AI assistant and cannot provide legal advice. Consult a qualified attorney before signing any contract. Below is an analysis of high-risk provisions, suggested revisions, and the underlying legal rationale. Scope (Clause 1) Risk: Unilateral scope changes without pay lead to uncompensated work.
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Our Verdict
Ling 3.0 Flash
Ling 3.0 Flash
Mercury 2.5 Preview
Mercury 2.5 Preview

Not enough votes to call it. On the specs, nothing separates them.

Too close to call

Reviewing agent-written code?See a Brief PR report

API pricing

Cost per 1M tokens

Ling 3.0 Flash
Input
$0.02
1.9× cheaper
Output
$0.06
2.4× cheaper
Mercury 2.5 Preview
Input
$0.04
Output
$0.15

Ling 3.0 Flash is cheaper on both: 1.9× input, 2.4× output.

Where to run it

3 hosts, cheapest first

Ling 3.0 Flash2 hosts
HostInOutContextUptime
NNovita$0.02 in·$0.06 out·262k·100% upDDeepInfrabf16$0.06 in·$0.18 out·131k·99.6% up
Mercury 2.5 Preview1 host
HostInOutContextUptime
Inception$0.04 in·$0.15 out·260k·100% up

Per million tokens. Prices and uptime via OpenRouter, checked 22 Sep 2026.

Research

What we learned reading every model

FAQ

Common questions

Ling 3.0 Flash is developed by inclusionAI while Mercury 2.5 Preview is developed by Inception. Ling 3.0 Flash has a 262K token context window vs Mercury 2.5 Preview's 260K. You can compare their actual outputs across 16 challenges on Rival to see how they differ in practice.

It depends on your use case. Ling 3.0 Flash and Mercury 2.5 Preview each have strengths in different areas. Rival lets you compare their real outputs side-by-side across 16 challenges so you can judge which fits your needs best.

Ling 3.0 Flash costs $0.021/M input tokens and Mercury 2.5 Preview costs $0.04/M input tokens. Ling 3.0 Flash is $0.02/M cheaper per input. Check their side-by-side outputs on Rival to see if the price difference is justified by quality.

This page shows a side-by-side comparison of Ling 3.0 Flash and Mercury 2.5 Preview 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.

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Model pages

Ling 3.0 Flash logo
Ling 3.0 Flash16 outputs, specs and price
Mercury 2.5 Preview logo
Mercury 2.5 Preview58 outputs, specs and price
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