## Google Gemini API pricing

Pricing page: https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/pricing. Verified 2026-10-23.
Lock-in: Low to medium: the API is simple to swap, but prompts and output quality need re-testing on another model.

### Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite (`gemini-3-5-flash-lite`): $0/month base
- Input tokens (per million): 0 included; then: $0.3 per 1,000
- Output tokens (per million): 0 included; then: $2.5 per 1,000
- Includes: commercial_use, ai.text, ai.vision
- Not yet priced: context caching ($0.03 per million plus storage), Grounding with Google Search past 5,000 requests a month ($14 per 1,000), Batch API discount
- Note: Paid tier: $0.30 input (text, image, video, audio) and $2.50 output per million tokens. A free tier exists in Google AI Studio, where prompts may be used to improve Google's products.

### Gemini 3.8 Flash (`gemini-3-8-flash`): $0/month base
- Input tokens (per million): 0 included; then: $1.5 per 1,000
- Output tokens (per million): 0 included; then: $7.5 per 1,000
- Includes: commercial_use, ai.text, ai.vision
- Not yet priced: introductory price until 2026-12-31 ($0.75 input, $3.75 output), context caching, Grounding with Google Search past 5,000 requests a month ($14 per 1,000)
- Note: Priced at the list rate from 2027-01-01: $1.50 input and $7.50 output per million tokens. Until 2026-12-31 it is $0.75 and $3.75, so costs before 2027 are overstated by half.

### Gemini 4 Argon (`gemini-4-argon`): $0/month base
- Input tokens (per million): 0 included; then: $4 per 1,000
- Output tokens (per million): 0 included; then: $20 per 1,000
- Includes: commercial_use, ai.text, ai.vision
- Not yet priced: introductory price until 2026-11-30 ($2.00 input, $10.00 output), context caching, Grounding with Google Search past 5,000 requests a month ($14 per 1,000)
- Note: Priced at the list rate from 2026-12-01: $4.00 input and $20.00 output per million tokens. Until 2026-11-30 it is $2.00 and $10.00. Not on the free tier.

**Sources**
- Google Gemini API: verified 2026-10-23 (https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/pricing)

Confidence: high.

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