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Gemini 4 Carbon vs Gemini 4 Hydrogen

Full profiles: Gemini 4 Carbon (Google) and Gemini 4 Hydrogen (Google): every benchmark, price and rank.

Updated · Data from 10 sources

As of 13 Nov 2026, Gemini 4 Carbon is ahead of Gemini 4 Hydrogen on quality (69.5 vs 63.4 on the BenchLeader Index), but Gemini 4 Hydrogen is 1.3× cheaper at $3.00 vs $4.00 per 1M tokens blended. Gemini 4 Carbon leads in every category we measure both in. Gemini 4 Hydrogen streams ~2× faster.

Key facts (as of 13 Nov 2026)

  • Gemini 4 Carbon scores 69.5 on the BenchLeader Index and Gemini 4 Hydrogen scores 63.4 (BenchLeader, 13 Nov 2026).
  • Gemini 4 Carbon costs $4.00 per 1M tokens blended (list price, 13 Nov 2026).
  • Gemini 4 Hydrogen costs $3.00 per 1M tokens blended (list price, 13 Nov 2026).
  • Gemini 4 Hydrogen streams ~2× faster than Gemini 4 Carbon (Artificial Analysis, 7-day median, 13 Nov 2026).
  • Of the 18 benchmarks both models have, Gemini 4 Carbon leads 16 (BenchLeader, 13 Nov 2026).
  • On Arena WebDev, Gemini 4 Carbon is rated 1768 and Gemini 4 Hydrogen 1704 (LMArena, as published by 13 Nov 2026).
Gemini 4 Carbon benchmarks high Google Gemini 4 Hydrogen benchmarks high GoogleAdd a third model

Which to pick for…

The pick's numbers come first. Category scores on the BenchLeader scale (50 is the average model, 15 points one standard deviation). High confidence means a lead of half a standard deviation or more; under one point is called either.

Use casePickWhyConfidence
CodingGemini 4 Carbon74 vs 69 category score; Arena WebDev 1768 vs 1704Medium
Agents & tool useGemini 4 Carbon76 vs 62 category score; AutomationBench 77.8% vs 74.4%High
MathsGemini 4 Carbon72 vs 68 category scoreMedium
ReasoningGemini 4 Carbon73 vs 70 category score; HLE-Diamond (AA) 69.1% vs 54.9%Medium
KnowledgeGemini 4 Carbon76 vs 69 category score; AA-Omniscience v1.1 53.5 vs 43.7High
Chat quality (human preference)Gemini 4 Carbon73 vs 68 on Arena votesMedium
Lowest costGemini 4 Hydrogen$3.00 vs $4.00 per 1M blended; agentic coding session $0.120 vs $0.160–
Fastest first answerGemini 4 Hydrogen16.4 s (Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)) vs 66.3 s (Gemini 4 Carbon (high)) to the first answer token–
High volume on a budgetNeither flagshipA smaller model is usually the better fit: Cheapest good LLMs, Fastest LLMs–

Key differences

  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high) leads on quality: 69.5 vs 63.4.
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high) is stronger in agents & tools, coding, human preference, knowledge, maths, reasoning.
  • Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high) is 1.3× cheaper ($3.00 vs $4.00 per 1M blended).
  • Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high) streams 2.5× faster (180 vs 72 tokens per second).

At a glance

SpecGemini 4 CarbonGemini 4 Hydrogen
DeveloperGoogleGoogle
Released28 Oct 202612 Nov 2026
Context window (tokens)1,048,5761,048,576
Compared atGemini 4 Carbon (high)Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)
Open weightsNoNo
Price in / out / cached input per 1M$2.00 / $10.00 / $0.100$1.50 / $7.50 / $0.075

Category by category

Category scores on the BenchLeader scale: 50 is the average evaluated model, 15 points is one standard deviation. A gap under one point is called level.

CategoryGemini 4 Carbon (high)Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)Leader
Reasoning73.269.6Gemini 4 Carbon
Coding74.168.8Gemini 4 Carbon
Agents & tools75.861.9Gemini 4 Carbon
Maths71.967.8Gemini 4 Carbon
Knowledge76.168.5Gemini 4 Carbon
Human preference72.668.2Gemini 4 Carbon
Long context64.3–not comparable

On one chart

Each domain on the index's own scale, where 50 is an average model. Click a domain to see the benchmarks behind it. Pick up to 5 models from the list.

2550 avg75ReasoningCodingAgents & toolsMathsKnowledgeHumanpreferenceGemini 4 Carbon, Reasoning: 73.2Gemini 4 Carbon, Coding: 74.1Gemini 4 Carbon, Agents & tools: 75.8Gemini 4 Carbon, Maths: 71.9Gemini 4 Carbon, Knowledge: 76.1Gemini 4 Carbon, Human preference: 72.6Gemini 4 Hydrogen, Reasoning: 69.6Gemini 4 Hydrogen, Coding: 68.8Gemini 4 Hydrogen, Agents & tools: 61.9Gemini 4 Hydrogen, Maths: 67.8Gemini 4 Hydrogen, Knowledge: 68.5Gemini 4 Hydrogen, Human preference: 68.2

Not drawn, measured for fewer than two of these models: Instruction following, Long context, Multimodal.

Model, click to add or removeIndex

Where sources disagree

Across the 18 benchmarks both have, Gemini 4 Carbon leads 16, Gemini 4 Hydrogen leads 2. Every overall index that rates both puts Gemini 4 Carbon ahead.

Overall indexGemini 4 Carbon (high)Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)Leader
BenchLeader Index69.563.4Gemini 4 Carbon
AA Intelligence Index v5.060.050.8Gemini 4 Carbon
Vals Index70.568.5†Gemini 4 Carbon
Arena Text15261490Gemini 4 Carbon

Each publisher runs its own tasks, harnesses and effort settings, so their overall verdicts can differ; BenchLeader reconciles them on one scale. † measured at another effort setting of the same model (the publisher did not test the one compared here).

Price, speed and latency

List prices blended at three input tokens per output token. Per-task prices use the token counts on the methodology page. Cost, tokens and time per benchmark task are measured: Artificial Analysis’ averages over its whole Intelligence Index run.

MeasureGemini 4 Carbon (high)Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)
Blended price per 1M tokens$4.00$3.00
Input / output per 1M$2.00 / $10.00$1.50 / $7.50
Cached input per 1M$0.100$0.075
Price per task: chat reply$0.0038$0.0029
Price per task: summarize a 30-page report$0.030$0.022
Price per task: code edit$0.027$0.020
Price per task: agentic coding session$0.160$0.120
Price per task: structured extraction$0.0060$0.0045
Agentic coding session, input mostly cached$0.074$0.056
Cost per benchmark task (AA Index)$5.48$1.87
Output tokens per task (AA Index)123k85k
Of which reasoning72k48k
Time per task (AA Index)29 min8 min
Output speed72 tok/s180 tok/s
Time to first answer66.3 s16.4 s
Time to a complete answer160.6 s63.3 s

Per token is not per task: an average task of Artificial Analysis' Intelligence Index cost $5.48 on Gemini 4 Carbon (high) and $1.87 on Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high), and Gemini 4 Carbon (high) wrote 1.4× as many output tokens for the same work, which a per-token price hides.

Each model is compared at its best-ranked reasoning-effort setting. Gemini 4 Carbon (high) scores 69.5 and takes 66 s to its first answer token; Gemini 4 Carbon (medium) scores 65.8 in 20 s, Gemini 4 Carbon scores 63.0 in 7 s. Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high) scores 63.4 and takes 16 s to its first answer token. Higher effort means more thinking before the answer: better scores, longer waits and more tokens billed. How reasoning effort changes scores and cost.

Every benchmark

73 benchmarks, grouped by category; each name links to the board and its leaders. † measured at another effort setting of the same model, shown for reference and not counted as a win.

MetricPublisherGemini 4 Carbon (high)Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)
BenchLeader IndexBenchLeader69.563.4
Agents & tools scoreBenchLeader75.861.9
Coding scoreBenchLeader74.168.8
Human preference scoreBenchLeader72.668.2
Knowledge scoreBenchLeader76.168.5
Long context scoreBenchLeader64.3–
Maths scoreBenchLeader71.967.8
Reasoning scoreBenchLeader73.269.6
Blended price $/MBenchLeader$4.00$3.00
Output speedBenchLeader72 tok/s180 tok/s
Time to first answerBenchLeader66.3 s16.4 s
Context windowBenchLeader1,048,576 tokens1,048,576 tokens
Reasoning
GPQA DiamondEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub96.5%–
SimpleBenchSimpleBench92.6%†–
Arena Hard PromptsArena (LMArena)15471514
LiveBench 2.0 ReasoningLiveBench90.6%†88.6%†
HLE-Diamond (AA)Artificial Analysis69.1%54.9%
ARC-AGI-1ARC Prize97.5%–
ARC-AGI-2ARC Prize92.1%–
ARC-AGI-3ARC Prize96.9%–
CritPt v2 hard subset (AA)Artificial Analysis69.0%61.5%
Chess PuzzlesEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub78.0%–
Mystery Game PuzzlesEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub73.0%–
Coding
SciCodeSciCode64.2%–
Arena CodingArena (LMArena)15681518
Arena WebDevArena (LMArena)17681704
LiveBench 2.0 CodingLiveBench91.0%†78.5%†
Vibe Code Bench v1.1Vals AI89.1%87.8%†
CursorBenchCursor60.4%–
FrontierSWEEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub61.2%–
Terminal-Bench 4.0 (AA)Artificial Analysis65.2%54.0%
Design Arena WebsiteDesign Arena1324†1316†
FrontierCode 2.0 (AA)Artificial Analysis40.6%36.3%
Agents & tools
Terminal-BenchTerminal-Bench–56.4%
APEX-AgentsMercor84.2%†–
Arena AgentArena (LMArena)17–
LiveBench Long AgenticLiveBench72.7%†61.8%†
Show all 73 benchmarks
MetricPublisherGemini 4 Carbon (high)Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high)
Agents & tools
LiveBench BrowserLiveBench80.0%†77.1%†
HiL-BenchScale AI SEAL50.3%†–
GDPval-AA v2.1Artificial Analysis1733–
Finance Agent v2.1Vals AI67.2%65.1%†
Harvey's Legal Agent Benchmark v1.1Vals AI17.5%11.3%†
Legal Research BenchVals AI55.8%53.9%†
Tax Agent BenchVals AI51.8%52.3%†
Terminal-Bench 4.0 (Vals)Vals AI63.1%54.0%†
Vending-Bench 2Andon Labs16484.2†–
AutomationBenchArtificial Analysis77.8%74.4%
GDP.pdf (AA)Artificial Analysis28.4%30.0%
AA-Briefcase v1.1Artificial Analysis16111497
GDPxGDPx by SemiAnalysis10.9%–
Design Arena AgenticDesign Arena1298†–
Terminal-Bench-Science 0.1 (AA)Artificial Analysis64.8%41.4%
FACTS SearchGoogle94.4%†–
Maths
FrontierMath Tiers 1–3Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub90.5%–
FrontierMath Tier 4Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub95.1%–
OTIS Mock AIMEEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub100.0%–
Arena MathsArena (LMArena)–1495
Knowledge
SimpleQA VerifiedEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub77.7%–
LiveBench 2.0 Data AnalysisLiveBench86.5%†83.2%†
LiveBench ResearchLiveBench92.5%†86.8%†
AA-Omniscience v1.1Artificial Analysis53.543.7
PRBench LegalScale AI SEAL53.4%†–
Excel Modeling Benchmark v1.1Vals AI76.5%75.8%†
DrugDiscoveryBenchScale AI SEAL71.5%–
EBR-benchEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub87.6%–
AA-Omniscience v1.1: accuracyArtificial Analysis58.3%48.2%
AA-Omniscience v1.1: non-hallucinationArtificial Analysis88.6%91.3%
Instruction following
Arena Instruction FollowingArena (LMArena)15251503
Human preference
Arena TextArena (LMArena)15261490
Arena Creative WritingArena (LMArena)15161492
Arena Multi-turnArena (LMArena)15641476
Arena Longer QueriesArena (LMArena)15381514
Multimodal
LiveBench DesignLiveBench80.2%†77.3%†
MMMU-ProArtificial Analysis89.3%†–
Blueprint-Bench 2Epoch AI Benchmarking Hub58.6%†–
Long context
AA-LCR v1.1Artificial Analysis79.3%–
MLCRArtificial Analysis19.4%21.1%†
Composite
Epoch Capabilities IndexEpoch AI Benchmarking Hub169.8†–
LiveBench 2.0LiveBench83.5%†77.0%†
AA Intelligence Index v5.0Artificial Analysis60.050.8
AA Progress Index v1Artificial Analysis350.8–
Vals IndexVals AI70.568.5†
Vals Finance IndexVals AI67.0%66.1%†
Vals RSI IndexVals AI27.7%–
Safety & honesty
FORTRESSScale AI SEAL16.4%†–

Data as of 2026-11-13. Best configuration of each model; every score links to its source on the model pages.

What changed

  • Gemini 4 Hydrogen (high): 10 new results (Arena Text, Arena Hard Prompts, Arena Coding…).
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): 1 new result (DrugDiscoveryBench); input price moved from $4.00/M to $2.00/M (50% down); output price moved from $20.00/M to $10.00/M (50% down); cost per task moved from $7.76/M to $5.48/M (29% down).
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): BenchLeader Index 68.5 → 69.9.
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): 13 new results (GPQA Diamond, FrontierMath Tiers 1–3, FrontierMath Tier 4…).
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): 2 new results (FrontierSWE, Vals RSI Index).
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): BenchLeader Index 69.3 → 68.5.
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): BenchLeader Index 68.8 → 69.3.
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): 1 score revision.
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): 2 score revisions.
  • Gemini 4 Carbon (high): 1 score revision.

Rankings: Best LLM overall · Best LLM for coding · Best LLM for agents · Best cheap LLMs

Gemini 4 Carbon vs Gemini 4 Hydrogen: questions

Is Gemini 4 Carbon better than Gemini 4 Hydrogen?
Gemini 4 Carbon (high) leads on quality: 69.5 vs 63.4. The BenchLeader Index combines every independent quality benchmark; Gemini 4 Carbon (high) is ahead overall as of 13 Nov 2026, but check the category scores for your use.
Gemini 4 Carbon vs Gemini 4 Hydrogen: which is cheaper, and will that change?
Gemini 4 Hydrogen is cheaper today: $3.00 against $4.00 per million tokens, blended at three input tokens per output token. No price change has been announced for either.
Is Gemini 4 Carbon or Gemini 4 Hydrogen better for coding?
Gemini 4 Carbon scores higher in coding (74 vs 69 on the category index, where 50 is average). On Arena WebDev, the top shared coding benchmark, it is 1768 for Gemini 4 Carbon against 1704 for Gemini 4 Hydrogen.
Which is faster, Gemini 4 Carbon or Gemini 4 Hydrogen?
Gemini 4 Hydrogen streams ~2× faster (180 vs 72 output tokens per second, Artificial Analysis 7-day median).
Is Gemini 4 Carbon or Gemini 4 Hydrogen better for agents and tool use?
Gemini 4 Carbon scores higher in agentic tasks (76 vs 62 on the category index, where 50 is average).
More questions (4)
Which is better for long documents?
Both accept 1,048,576 tokens of context.
Which has lower latency?
Gemini 4 Hydrogen answers first: 16.4 s against 66.3 s to the first answer token, as Artificial Analysis measures it. Reasoning effort drives most of this: a higher setting thinks longer before it answers.
Do independent benchmarks agree on Gemini 4 Carbon vs Gemini 4 Hydrogen?
Across the 18 benchmarks both have, Gemini 4 Carbon leads 16, Gemini 4 Hydrogen leads 2. Every overall index that rates both puts Gemini 4 Carbon ahead.
When was Gemini 4 Hydrogen released?
Gemini 4 Hydrogen was released on 12 Nov 2026.