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DeepSeek V4.1 Flash vs Inkling 2 Small

Practical read: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash costs about a ninth as much. One API key runs both.

No card required. Start with 1 million free tokens.

Side by side:

DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash compared with Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small
Attribute DeepSeek V4.1 Flash deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash Inkling 2 Small thinkingmachines/inkling-2-small
Price, 1M in + out $0.16 Engy, cheapest route $1.37 Cloudflare Workers AI, cheapest route
Best for Low cost
Input / output, 1M $0.032 / $0.13 $0.32 / $1.06
Cached input $0.01/1M to $0.1899/1M $0.1055/1M
Context window 1.05M 1,048,576 tokens 1.05M 1,048,576 tokens
First token, p50 0.82 s via Tinfoil Measuring
Throughput 243 tok/s via CoralBricks Measuring
AI IQ IQ 125 #28 on AI IQ IQ 126 #27 on AI IQ
Provider routes 21 with failover 2 with failover
Privacy Confidential E2EE and zero retention route Zero retention route
Recent route uptime range 100.00% not enough data
Publisher DeepSeek Thinking Machines Lab
Modes chat decide chat
More detail

Price adds one million input and one million output tokens on the cheapest route. Prices and speed change: see the monthly reports and run a small eval before you choose a default.

Test both with your agent

Paste this into Claude Code, Cursor or any coding agent.

Compare DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and Inkling 2 Small in this project through TrustedRouter.

1. Read https://trustedrouter.com/docs/llms.txt
2. Point the OpenAI-compatible client at
   https://api.trustedrouter.com/v1 and read the key from
   TRUSTEDROUTER_API_KEY.
3. Run our eval prompts on deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash, then on thinkingmachines/inkling-2-small.
4. Show me cost, latency and quality side by side before changing the default.
import os
from openai import OpenAI

client = OpenAI(
    base_url="https://api.trustedrouter.com/v1",
    api_key=os.environ["TRUSTEDROUTER_API_KEY"],
)
for model in ("deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash", "thinkingmachines/inkling-2-small"):
    response = client.chat.completions.create(
        model=model,
        messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "What is the capital of France?"}],
    )
    print(model, response.choices[0].message.content)
for model in deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash thinkingmachines/inkling-2-small; do
  curl https://api.trustedrouter.com/v1/chat/completions \
    -H "Authorization: Bearer $TRUSTEDROUTER_API_KEY" \
    -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
    -d "{\"model\": \"$model\", \"messages\": [{\"role\": \"user\", \"content\": \"What is the capital of France?\"}]}"
done
Your agent will need an API key.

Questions

Which should I use, DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash or Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small?

DeepSeek V4.1 Flash has the lower published input-plus-output rate and more Credits provider routes. Their context windows are the same size. There is not enough recent probe data to compare speed.

Is DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash or Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small cheaper?

The current cheapest TrustedRouter route is $0.15825/1M for DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and $1.3715/1M for Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small. The comparison uses current catalog prices and updates as provider pricing changes.

Is DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash or Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small faster?

Current measured p50 time to first token is 822 ms for DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and not enough data for Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small. These are routed probe measurements, not vendor-advertised speeds, and update as new samples arrive.

Can I test DeepSeek: DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and Thinking Machines: Inkling 2 Small with the same API?

Yes. Use the same OpenAI-compatible TrustedRouter base URL and API key, then change only the model id between deepseek/deepseek-v4.1-flash and thinkingmachines/inkling-2-small. This makes side-by-side evals possible without maintaining two provider integrations.

More comparisons

All comparisons

Try DeepSeek V4.1 Flash and Inkling 2 Small with one key.

TrustedRouter is useful when you know the model you want, but still need provider rollover, budget limits, usage records, and a prompt path you can verify.

No card required. Start with 1 million free tokens.

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