Google's Gemini 4 Argon is out at $2/$10; the API price doubles December 1

Google made Gemini 4 Argon (gemini-4-argon) generally available on October 13, 2026. Google calls it its flagship reasoning model, aimed at complex software engineering, math and science, and long-running agents. The launch price runs through November 30, 2026; from December 1, the input, output and cached-input prices double.

What it costs

Paid tier, per 1M tokens, from Google’s pricing page on October 18, 2026:

Per 1M tokens	Through Nov 30, 2026	From Dec 1, 2026
Input	$2.00	$4.00
Output (incl. thinking)	$10.00	$20.00
Cached input (implicit only)	$0.10	$0.20

• Batch requests cost half: $1 input and $5 output until November 30.
• Search grounding includes 5,000 free requests a month, shared across Gemini 3 and newer models, then $14 per 1,000.
• Argon is not on the free tier.

At the December price, Argon matches Claude Opus 5.5’s $4 input and $20 output. At the launch price it matches OpenAI’s GPT-6.1 Sol ($2 and $10).

Specs

Gemini 4 Argon
Token limit	1,048,576, shared between input and output
Max output	65,536 by default; up to 1,048,576 with long decode
Input	Text, images, video, audio and PDF
Output	Text
Thinking levels	Low, medium, high
Caching	Implicit only; explicit caching isn’t supported

Where you can use it

Developers get it through the paid Gemini API in AI Studio. In the Gemini app and AI Mode in Search, it is for Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers. Ultra subscribers can also use it in Google Antigravity. Google’s announcement says Argon ranks first on the Vals Index and scores 87% on the ERQA embodied-reasoning test; these are Google’s own claims.

What to do

If you test Argon now, budget for the December 1 price, not the launch price. A workload that costs $500 a month in tokens in November will cost about $1,000 at the same volume in December.