Thinking Machines Lab unveils new model with AI index score of 31

Thinking Machines Lab released Inkling 2 Small, a Mixture-of-Experts model that activates 17 billion of its 594 billion total parameters at inference and scored 31 points on the Artificial Analysis model index. The model accepts image inputs but not audio, and lets users adjust the amount of reasoning compute applied per task. The launch matters because it puts a sparse, compute-tunable multimodal model into a crowded field where activated-parameter counts and benchmark scores are the main comparables. What to watch next is whether independent evaluations confirm the 31-point index score and how the adjustable reasoning control affects cost and latency in real deployments.