Google Gemma 4 26B A4B: Mixture-of-Experts open model with 26B total but only 4B active parameters per token, running near 4B model speed with 256K context.
Capabilities, design details, and architectural traits
Gemma 4 26B A4B is Google's Mixture-of-Experts (MoE) model in the Gemma 4 family. The A4B in its name means 4B active parameters - only 4 billion of the 26 billion total parameters activate per token during inference. Google officially documents it as running almost as fast as a 4B-parameter model, while carrying the capacity of a 26B model for routing and expert diversity.
| Trait | Detail |
|---|---|
| MoE inference pattern | 26B total parameters loaded into memory; only a 4B active subset used per token - explicitly designed for high-throughput with near-4B latency |
| Documented speed | Runs almost as fast as a dense 4B model despite 26B total weight, contrasting with the 31B dense sibling which maximizes raw quality |
| MTP (Multi-Token Prediction) | Supported but MoE-specific: gains depend on batch size; at batch size 1, expert weight reuse is limited and speedups are not guaranteed across all hardware |
| Context window | 256K tokens - same as the 12B and 31B variants, larger than E2B/E4B (128K) |
| Architecture reuse | Serves as the base architecture for DiffusionGemma, Google's experimental discrete text-diffusion model |
Within the Gemma 4 family, the 26B A4B is the variant explicitly designated for high-throughput use. Where the 31B dense model is positioned to maximize raw quality and fine-tuning depth, the 26B A4B trades some of that quality ceiling for significantly faster tokens-per-second in production inference workloads.
Independent evaluations · Artificial Analysis
Evaluate specifications, pricing, and independent benchmark indices
| Model Details | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| General Info | |||
| Provider | Anthropic | Anthropic | |
| Release Date | April 2, 2026 | July 24, 2026 | June 9, 2026 |
| Knowledge Cutoff | - | May 2026 | - |
| Context & Limits | |||
| Context Window | 262K | 1M Best Context Window | 1M Best Context Window |
| Pricing (per 1M tokens) | |||
| Input Pricing | $0.13 Best Input Pricing | $5 | $10 |
| Output Pricing | $0.40 Best Output Pricing | $25 | $50 |
| Modalities | |||
| Inputs | imagetextvideo | textimage | textimagefile |
| Outputs | text | text | text |
| Benchmarks (0-100) | |||
| Intelligence Index | 20.4 | 63.1 Best Intelligence Index | 62.1 |
| Coding Index | - | 78.0 Best Coding Index | 76.5 |
| Agentic Index | - | 59.2 Best Agentic Index | 56.6 |
Graduate-level reasoning and expert Q&A evaluation.
Extremely difficult logical reasoning and knowledge.
Logical reasoning over long context windows.
Independent evaluation data provided by Artificial Analysis. To view the latest benchmarks and full details, visit their official site.
