Gemini 4 Argon or GPT-6 Astra: which to choose?

Side-by-side comparison

Criterion	Gemini 4 Argon	GPT-6 Astra
Developer	Google DeepMind	OpenAI
Released	October 13, 2026	September 4, 2026
Capability index	95.3 / 100	94.7 / 100
Input price	$2	$10
Output price	$10	$50
Cost of a typical task	$0.06	$0.30
Context window	1,048,576 tokens	1,050,000 tokens
Maximum output	32,768 tokens	128,000 tokens
Reasoning mode	Yes	Yes
Tool calling	Yes	Yes
Accepted inputs	text, image, video, audio, PDF	text, image, PDF
Open weights	No	No
Knowledge cutoff	March 2026	April 30, 2026

The match-up at a glance

Gemini 4 Argon and GPT-6 Astra are two frontier models, the ones you pick when quality comes first, one from Google DeepMind, the other from OpenAI. Gemini 4 Argon was released on October 13, 2026, GPT-6 Astra on September 4, 2026.

All figures below come from public sources checked on October 22, 2026: models.dev and OpenRouter for prices and capabilities, Epoch AI for scores.

Performance

On our capability index, Gemini 4 Argon scores 95.3 out of 100 and GPT-6 Astra 94.7. The gap is too small to separate them.

On the 5 benchmarks reported for both, Gemini 4 Argon wins 2 times and GPT-6 Astra 2:

GPQA Diamond (PhD-level science questions): Gemini 4 Argon 96.4%, GPT-6 Astra 95.8%
OTIS Mock AIME (competition mathematics problems): Gemini 4 Argon 100%, GPT-6 Astra 100%
FrontierMath (very hard research-level mathematics): Gemini 4 Argon 86%, GPT-6 Astra 93.7%
FrontierCode (advanced programming tasks): Gemini 4 Argon 47.6%, GPT-6 Astra 53.3%
APEX-Agents (professional tasks carried out by an agent): Gemini 4 Argon 82.4%, GPT-6 Astra 64.7%

Budget

Gemini 4 Argon costs $2 per million input tokens and $10 per million output tokens; GPT-6 Astra costs $10 and $50.

For a typical agent task (read 20,000 tokens, write 2,000), expect $0.06 with Gemini 4 Argon versus $0.30 with GPT-6 Astra. Gemini 4 Argon is 5 times cheaper, a gap that adds up quickly over 1,000 tasks: $240 difference.

Run the numbers with your own volumes in the agent cost calculator.

Context and capabilities

GPT-6 Astra reads more in one go: 1,050,000 tokens of context (roughly 1,575 pages), versus 1,048,576 for Gemini 4 Argon.

Reasoning mode: Gemini 4 Argon yes, GPT-6 Astra yes. Tool calling: Gemini 4 Argon yes, GPT-6 Astra yes. Image input: Gemini 4 Argon yes, GPT-6 Astra yes.

Neither publishes its weights: both are used through an API.

Knowledge cutoff: March 2026 for Gemini 4 Argon, April 30, 2026 for GPT-6 Astra.

In short

Our reading of the data:

Choose Gemini 4 Argon for a lower cost.

This verdict relies on public figures; it does not replace a trial on your own tasks.

Frequently asked questions

Gemini 4 Argon or GPT-6 Astra: which is better?

On our index (Epoch AI data), Gemini 4 Argon scores 95.3 and GPT-6 Astra 94.7 out of 100. The best choice also depends on price and on your use case.

Which one is cheaper?

Gemini 4 Argon. To read 20,000 tokens and write 2,000, expect $0.06 with Gemini 4 Argon and $0.30 with GPT-6 Astra (prices as of October 22, 2026).

Which one has the larger context window?

GPT-6 Astra, with 1,050,000 tokens versus 1,048,576.

Can I run Gemini 4 Argon or GPT-6 Astra on my own servers?

No: both are closed models, available through an API.

Gemini 4 Argon versus GPT-6 Astra