Z.ai: GLM 5 vs Thinking Machines: Inkling: Live Promos, Pricing, Hidden Fees & Latency
Verified 2026 FinOps benchmark comparing Z.ai: GLM 5 (z-ai/glm-5) vs Thinking Machines: Inkling (thinkingmachines/inkling). Simulate cache read multipliers, context cliffs, MAU bills, and P90 latency.
Z.ai: GLM 5 (z-ai/glm-5) 2026 Q4 Developer Promotion & Volume Credits
Official 2026 Q4 promotion for Z.ai: GLM 5: Activate ephemeral prefix caching to slash input costs by 50% (down to $0.5/1M) or route via asynchronous Batch API for 50% off standard token rates.
Thinking Machines: Inkling (thinkingmachines/inkling) 2026 Q4 Developer Promotion & Volume Credits
Official 2026 Q4 promotion for Thinking Machines: Inkling: Activate ephemeral prefix caching to slash input costs by 50% (down to $0.5/1M) or route via asynchronous Batch API for 50% off standard token rates.
In Etuki October 2026 FinOps telemetry comparing Z.ai: GLM 5 (API ID: z-ai/glm-5) vs Thinking Machines: Inkling (API ID: thinkingmachines/inkling), Z.ai: GLM 5 offers lower standard input pricing at $1/1M tokens ($3.2/1M output), while Z.ai: GLM 5 leads in cached prefix economics at $0.5/1M tokens (50% discount). Z.ai: GLM 5 achieves a 0ms faster P90 time-to-first-token latency (280ms vs 280ms).
Auto-discovered via live global telemetry registry.
Auto-discovered via live global telemetry registry.
| Specification / FinOps Dimension | Z.ai: GLM 5 | Thinking Machines: Inkling | Verified Advantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Official Vendor API ID | z-ai/glm-5 | thinkingmachines/inkling | Pinned Snapshot IDs |
| Standard Input / Output (per 1M) | $1 / $3.2 | $1 / $4.05 | Z.ai: GLM 5 |
| Cache Read Price (per 1M) | $0.5/1M (50% Off) | $0.5/1M (50% Off) | Z.ai: GLM 5 |
| Context Window / Max Output | 200K In / 128K Out | 512K In / 461K Out | Thinking Machines: Inkling |
| P90 First-Token / Edge Latency | 280ms | 280ms | Z.ai: GLM 5 (-0ms) |
GLM-5 is Z.ai’s flagship open-source foundation model engineered for complex systems design and long-horizon agent workflows. Built for expert developers, it delivers production-gr
Inkling is an open-weight multimodal mixture-of-experts model from Thinking Machines Lab, with 41B active parameters out of 975B total. It is designed for general-purpose reasoning
Real-Time Stack Cost & Hidden-Fee Simulator (MAU / Token / Egress / GMV)
Calibrated with Reddit r/FinOps & r/devops telemetry: Includes Context Caching, Bandwidth Egress, and MoR Tax
🛰️Switch from Z.ai: GLM 5 to Thinking Machines: Inkling
Inkling is an open-weight multimodal mixture-of-experts model from Thinking Machines Lab, with 41B active parameters out of 975B total. It is designed for general-purpose reasoning Verified P90 latency of 280ms.