Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview vs Gemini 4 Argon
Gemini 4 Argon is the newer Google model and, until 30 November 2026, the cheaper one: $2 input and $10 output per 1M tokens against $2 and $12 for Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview. From 1 December 2026 Argon costs $4 and $20, and Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview has the lower input and output prices at every prompt size.
Prices today and from December
Today our feature session costs $10.80 on Argon and $11.04 on Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview, and a long agent day $97.50 against $99. The cache widens the gap, because cached input on Argon is $0.10 against $0.20: $2.59 against $3.26 for the cached feature session.
Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview has a long-prompt rate, $4 and $18 past 200K tokens; Argon has one price. That is why filling the whole window once costs $4.19 on Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview and $2.10 on Argon.
Same size, same inputs
Both read up to 1.05M tokens, write up to 66K tokens in one reply, and take text, images, video, audio and PDF files.
Dates and scores
Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview was first listed on the API on 19 February 2026; Google released Argon on 30 September 2026, seven months later. The only score between them is Argon's 57.4% on Terminal-Bench 4.0, from Google's table as HackerNoon reproduced it. Opus 5.5 against Gemini 4 Argon sets that score against Anthropic's.
Side by side
| Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Gemini 4 Argon | |
|---|---|---|
| Maker | ||
| Released | 19 February 2026[1] first API listing | 30 September 2026[2] |
| Context window | 1.05M tokens[3] | 1.05M tokens[4] |
| Max output | 66K tokens[3] | 66K tokens[4] |
| Input price | $2 per 1M tokens[5] | $2 per 1M tokens[5] |
| Output price | $12 per 1M tokens[5] | $10 per 1M tokens[5] |
| Cached input | $0.20 per 1M tokens[5] | $0.10 per 1M tokens[5] |
| Long prompts | Over 200K: $4 in, $18 out[5] Prompts over 200K tokens are billed at the higher rate. | One price |
| Price change | None announced | Introductory price through 30 November 2026; $4 input and $20 output per 1M tokens from 1 December 2026.[5] |
| Open weights | No[6] Served through the Gemini API; no weights are published. | No[6] Served through the Gemini API; no weights are published. |
| Reads | text, image, video, audio, pdf[3] | text, image, video, audio, pdf[4] |
Benchmarks
None of the benchmarks below has a published score for both models. We only show a score we can cite with its source and date; "Not published" means we found none for that model, not that it scored zero.
| Benchmark | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Gemini 4 Argon |
|---|---|---|
| Terminal-Bench 4.0Agentic coding tasks in a real terminal. | Not published | 57.4%[7] Google's comparison table as reproduced by HackerNoon. |
| FrontierCode 1.1 (Main)Hard software engineering tasks. | Not published | Not published |
| Humanity's Last Exam (with tools)Expert-level questions across many fields, tools allowed. | Not published | Not published |
What a coding session costs
Our own estimate from the list prices above, for three sessions we define: a coding agent resends the conversation with every call, so prompts are large and grow. "Cached" assumes 90% of prompt tokens are read from the prompt cache and leaves out cache write fees. A long-prompt price applies when a call's prompt is over its threshold. Work out your own mix with the token cost calculator.
| Session | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview cached | Gemini 4 Argon | Gemini 4 Argon cached |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quick fix10 calls of 25K prompt and 1.5K output tokens | $0.68 | $0.28 | $0.65 | $0.22 |
| Feature session60 calls of 80K prompt and 2K output tokens | $11.04 | $3.26 | $10.80 | $2.59 |
| Long agent day300 calls of 150K prompt and 2.5K output tokens | $99 | $26.10 | $97.50 | $20.55 |
Value for money and release gap
Gemini 4 Argon is dated 7 months later (223 days; Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview: first API listing). Price per point divides our feature-session cost by a published score: lower means more score for the money. It is a rough lens, not a ranking.
| Measure | Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | Gemini 4 Argon |
|---|---|---|
| Input tokens per $1 | 500K | 500K |
| Filling the whole context window once | $4.19 | $2.10 |
Questions
Is Gemini 4 Argon cheaper than Gemini 3.1 Pro?
Until 30 November 2026, slightly: $10 against $12 per 1M output tokens at the same $2 input. From 1 December 2026 Argon costs $4 and $20, more than Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview.
Do Gemini 4 Argon and Gemini 3.1 Pro have the same context window?
Yes, 1.05M tokens each, and both write up to 66K tokens in a reply.
When did each come out?
Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview was first listed on the API on 19 February 2026. Google released Gemini 4 Argon on 30 September 2026.
Most compared
Any other two models: pick them in the lists at the top of the page.
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs Gemini 4 Argon
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Gemini 4 Argon
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview
- Gemini 4 Argon vs GPT-6.1 Sol
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5
- Claude Fable 5.1 vs Claude Opus 5.5
- Claude Opus 5 vs Claude Opus 5.5
- Claude Sonnet 5 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5
- Claude Haiku 5.5 vs Claude Sonnet 5.5
- Claude Haiku 4.5 vs Claude Haiku 5.5
- Claude Fable 5 vs Claude Fable 5.1
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs GPT-6.1 Sol
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs GPT-6.1 Sol
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs GPT-5.6 Sol
- Claude Fable 5.1 vs GPT-6 Astra
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs GPT-6 Astra
- Claude Haiku 5.5 vs GPT-6 Luna
- GPT-6.1 Sol vs GPT-6 Sol
- GPT-6.1 Sol vs GPT-6 Astra
- Claude Haiku 5.5 vs Gemini 3.8 Flash
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs Grok 4.7
- Claude Opus 5.5 vs DeepSeek V4 Pro
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs Kimi K3
- Claude Sonnet 5.5 vs GLM-5.3
More tools
Sources
- openrouter.ai: google/gemini-3.1-pro-preview, read
- blog.google: innovation-and-ai/models-and-research/gemini-models/gemini-4-argon, read
- ai.google.dev: gemini-api/docs/models/gemini-3.1-pro-preview, read
- ai.google.dev: gemini-api/docs/models/gemini-4-argon, read
- ai.google.dev: gemini-api/docs/pricing, read
- ai.google.dev: gemini-api/docs/models, read
- hackernoon.com: gemini-4-argon-how-does-it-do-against-gpt-6-astra-and-claude, read
Numbers from the makers' own pages, checked by hand, last read . List prices in US dollars before tax. Spotted a mistake? office@shuriken.sh.
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