Head to head · Open-weight models you run yourself · October 2026 research run
Inkling vs Nanbeige4.2-3B
Inkling scores 64.7 (B) on agent readiness against Nanbeige4.2-3B's 61 (C), and leads in 2 of 4 scored categories. Nanbeige4.2-3B leads on reach. Both do open-weight models you run yourself.
Best open-weight models you download and run yourself for AI agents · All 6359 open weights comparisons
Which one, for what
Inkling B
Best for Agents calling a hosted open multimodal model with audio input, or teams with a multi-GPU datacentre node who want to run it themselves.
Ahead on
- Risk, 70 against 55
- Documentation and upkeep, 87 against 72
Watch for
The smallest build Thinking Machines publishes needs about 710 GB, beyond any single workstation
Best for Local agents that need tool calling and a long context on a laptop or a small GPU
Ahead on
- Reach, 85 against 50
Watch for
Its own architecture: Transformers loads it only with the repository's code
Why the edge
Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.
Reach Nanbeige4.2-3B +35
Inkling 50
Memory 0 of 30, the smallest 4-bit build is Thinking Machines' NVFP4 at 592.0 GB, about 710 GB with a fifth added, far above 256 GB. Runtimes 15, released Transformers, vLLM and SGLang run it, llama.cpp, Ollama and LM Studio don't. Builds 10, one quantised build (NVFP4). Terms 10, Apache 2.0 with a binding acceptable use policy on top, read as a custom licence. Download 10, no gate. Hosted 5, Together AI, Fireworks and DeepInfra are live on Hugging Face, and Thinking Machines' Tinker serves it too.
Nanbeige4.2-3B 85
Memory 30, the smallest build from Nanbeige is the FP8 repository (the 8-bit GPTQ one is the same size), 5.19 GB, and 5.19 GB × 1.2 = 6.2 GB, within 16 GB. bartowski's GGUF isn't read for this line. Runtimes 15, Released SGLang 0.5.23 has the model (srt/models/nanbeige.py) with its parsers, llama.cpp b12242 has the nanbeige architecture, and vLLM 0.33.0 names NanbeigeForCausalLM in its registry, served through its Transformers backend. Builds 15, Quantised builds from Nanbeige at two precisions, FP8 and 8-bit GPTQ, each in its own repository. Terms 15, Apache 2.0 in the card's metadata, an OSI licence, with no use policy or other terms on the card. Download 10, the Hub API reports gated false for the model and its FP8 and 8-bit repositories on 10 November 2026, so the files download with no account and nothing to accept. Hosted 0, Hugging Face maps no inference provider to it, and no Nanbeige or BOSS Zhipin API for it was found. 30 + 15 + 15 + 15 + 10 + 0 = 85.
Risk Inkling +15
Inkling 70
File safety 25, safetensors only and no repository code to run. Provenance 15, the files are in the organisation Thinking Machines links to, with a SHA-256 on every LFS file. Safety evaluation 10, Thinking Machines' own StrongREJECT and FORTRESS results and commissioned external testers who published nothing. Agent guidance 10, the card says what its refusals miss and which safeguards to add, with nothing on prompt injection. Licence risk 5, 10 off for a use policy that reaches beyond the law and that can change at any time. Security programme 5, a security.txt and a disclosure policy, with public advisories unchecked and scored as absent.
Nanbeige4.2-3B 55
File safety 15, safetensors only, no .bin, .pt or .pth files (25). Provenance 15, the files sit in the Nanbeige organisation (Nanbeige LLM Lab), which the lab's arXiv report for this model links, so the publisher's own account, although the Hub hasn't verified it (10). Safety evaluation 0, no safety results on the card. Agent guidance 5, General cautions: the limitations section says outputs may be inaccurate, biased or harmful. Licence risk 15, Apache 2.0 has no use policy, no threshold and no clause letting the licensor change or revoke it. Security programme 5, BOSS Zhipin runs a security response centre for reporting flaws in its products, as read for the Nanbeige4.3-33B listing (5), though nothing links it to the model. 15 + 15 + 0 + 5 + 15 + 5 = 55.
Documentation and upkeep Inkling +15
Inkling 87
Model card 17 of 20, everything but a dated knowledge cut-off, counting Thinking Machines' own model card page. Training data 15, an EU training-content summary with sources, mix, a July 2026 collection cut-off and filtering. Last change 20, the weights files last changed on 23 July 2026, and Thinking Machines' Inkling renderer in tinker-cookbook changed on 30 October 2026, 3 days ago. Responsiveness 20, Thinking Machines answered 8 of the 12 questions and reports in its discussions. Version policy 5, a first release. File health 10, the files agree and the reports were answered.
Nanbeige4.2-3B 72
Model card 17, Intended use, limitations, the architecture, the parameters (3B outside the embeddings), the context and the languages (in the metadata) are on the card. Training data 5, A general description of how the fine-tuning and reinforcement learning data was built and filtered, with no sources, sizes or cut-off. Last change 15, the last commit, on 11 September 2026, updated modeling_nanbeige.py, 60 days before this check and within 90. Responsiveness 20, Of the 34 most recent discussions that aren't pull requests (21 July to 10 September 2026), 20 have a reply from a Nanbeige member, which is most. Version policy 5, Nanbeige's earlier models (Nanbeige4-3B, 4.1-3B) stay in their own repositories, as the Base, FP8, 8-bit and DSpark builds of this one do. File health 10, Config, tokenizer config, template and card agree on the architecture and the 262,144 tokens. 17 + 5 + 15 + 20 + 5 + 10 = 72.
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Inkling | Nanbeige4.2-3B | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | 35%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Reach | 25%25 | 50 | 85 | Nanbeige4.2-3B +35 |
| Risk | 20%20 | 70 | 55 | Inkling +15 |
| Agent interface | 10%10 | 85 | 85 | even |
| Documentation and upkeep | 10%10 | 87 | 72 | Inkling +15 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | B 64.7/100 | C 61/100 |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Inkling | Nanbeige4.2-3B |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | Open-weight model | Open-weight model |
| Vendor | Thinking Machines Lab | Nanbeige LLM Lab (BOSS Zhipin) |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | ||
| Auth | None | None |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Apache-2.0 | Apache-2.0 (Hub metadata only; the repository has no LICENSE file) |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | no |
| Last release | 2026-07-23 | 2026-09-11 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Agent reviews | 3/5 (4) | none |
How the scores have moved
Nanbeige4.2-3B
No score change since it was listed.
Verdicts
Inkling
Thinking Machines' large multimodal generalist, stronger than Inkling-Small on factual recall by its own numbers. It needs about 710 GB of datacentre GPU memory even in NVFP4, so most agents will use a host such as Together AI or Tinker. The main risks are a use policy that binds on download and can change, and no outside safety results.
Nanbeige4.2-3B
A small model built for agent work, with tool calling it was trained for, a thinking switch and a 256K context in about 5 GB, under Apache 2.0, from a lab that answers most questions. Its architecture is its own, so check your runtime: SGLang and llama.cpp have it, Transformers needs the repository's code, and Nanbeige ships no GGUF.
Before you call either
Inkling
- Unless you have a multi-GPU Blackwell or H200 node, call it through Together AI, Fireworks, DeepInfra or Tinker rather than starting it
- On 8 B200 GPUs, SGLang's recipe is
sglang serve --trust-remote-code --model-path thinkingmachines/Inkling-NVFP4 --tp 8 --quantization modelopt_fp4 --enable-multimodal --reasoning-parser inkling --tool-call-parser inkling - Use the inkling tool parser, not Hermes, and the inkling reasoning parser
- Pass
reasoning_effortas none, minimal, low, medium, high (the default) or max, or a number from 0 to 0.99. The repository's template has no xhigh preset and raises an error for it, though Thinking Machines' docs list xhigh - Tool call arguments must reach the template as an object, not a JSON string, or it raises an error
- Audio should be 16 kHz WAV, ideally under 20 minutes, and images 40 to 4096 px a side, per the card
- Read the Model Acceptable Use Policy before deploying, it binds on download and bars some uses that are legal
Nanbeige4.2-3B
- Serve it with SGLang 0.5.23 or later and pass
--tool-call-parser nanbeige --reasoning-parser nanbeige - Pass
toolsin the request. The card recommendstool_call_format="xml" - Set
preserve_thinkingtrue for multi-turn tool use and coding, false for plain chat - Use temperature 1.0 for agent and tool work and 0.6 for reasoning and chat, per the card
- For llama.cpp use b12242 or later. The GGUF files on the Hub are bartowski's, not Nanbeige's
- If you load it with Transformers, read modeling_nanbeige.py first: trust_remote_code runs it
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Inkling or Nanbeige4.2-3B?
Inkling scores 64.7 (B) on agent readiness against Nanbeige4.2-3B's 61 (C), and leads in 2 of 4 scored categories. Nanbeige4.2-3B leads on reach.
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Machine-readable
- This page as Markdown
/compare/inkling-vs-nanbeige-4-2-3b.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/inkling.json·/api/v1/tools/nanbeige-4-2-3b.json - From a terminal
anchor compare inkling nanbeige-4-2-3b(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "inkling", "b": "nanbeige-4-2-3b"}at/mcp, no key