Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
Google · released Jul 21, 2026
- Type
- Proprietary
- Input
- $0.30
- Output
- $2.50
- Cached
- Not published
List price · per 1M tokens · Google AI at 1M context · source ↗ · a reseller below undercuts it; the table carries the spread
Our take
Written Aug 3, 2026Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite is a lightweight multimodal model from Google that can handle up to one million tokens in a single request and accepts text, images, files, audio and video. Its measured coding skill stands well above its other arena scores, while maths and creative writing lag behind.
Choose this for long-document workflows where multimodal input matters and you need a one-million-token request limit. Use it for coding assistance, where its measured skill peaks, or for budget-conscious production work at the base throughput tier. Pick the higher-throughput tier if you need speed for interactive use. Skip it if you need strong maths performance, want to self-host, or need a permissive licence for redistribution.
The case for it
- Exceptional context length for its price tier: a one-million-token window at the base tier.
- Strongest measured skill is coding, with an arena score almost 50 points above its own overall average.
- Hard prompts are handled better than its own average, by about 19 points.
- Same provider offers a 20-fold speed range from 5 to 100 tokens per second, at multipliers from 2× to 3.6× the base rate.
The case against it
- Maths is a clear weak spot versus its own other skills, with an arena score more than 85 points below its coding score.
- Creative writing lags its own average by 22 points.
- No open weights or independent hosting: proprietary weights with no licence disclosed.
How good is it?
IntelligencePuzzles, maths, exam questions
Arena Text (overall)30th of 143 · 1456.5
CodingWriting and fixing code on its own
Arena Coding28th of 143 · 1506.2
AgenticPlanning, calling tools, staying on task
Arena Agent (IPS)32nd of 36 · −0.102
WritingWe do not rate this
Two boards come close and neither tests writing: Arena Creative Writing asks people which of two replies they prefer, and LiveBench Language tests whether a model understood a passage. So we show where Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite placed and give it no mark out of five.
These tests check whether a model follows instructions — a precondition for all the work above, but not a measure of how well that work is done, which is why they get no rating.
Every published score for this model16 scoresEvery figure we hold, from 16 boards, with who ran it and a link to the source — including the boards no rating above is built on.
Or rent it from someone else
Why this differs from the header. The strip above quotes Google AI's own list price. This is the cheapest live offer at the widest standard context we hold, whoever is serving it — a reseller undercutting a lab is ordinary commerce, not an error.
- per 1M tokens
- $0.30 in / $2.50 out
- Context served
- 1M
- Throughput
- Not measured
| Provider | In / out per 1M tokens | Context | Throughput | Trains on prompts | Logs prompts | Zero retention |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Google Vertex AIglobal | $0.15 / $1.25 | 1M | 23 tok/s | No | No | Confirmed |
| Google AI Studioflex tier | $0.15 / $1.25 | 1M | 5 tok/s | No | Yes55 days | Unknown |
| OpenRouter | $0.30 / $2.50 | 1M | not measured | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown |
| Google AI | $0.30 / $2.50 | 1M66K out | not measured | Unknown | Unknown | Unknown |
| Google AI Studio | $0.30 / $2.50 | 1M | 100 tok/s | No | Yes55 days | Unknown |
| Google AI Studiopriority tier | $0.54 / $4.50 | 1M | 78 tok/s | No | Yes55 days | Unknown |
Google Vertex AI
Google AI StudioAcross the 6 listings we hold: 4 say they do not train on prompts, 0 say they do and 2 do not say. 1 appear in the zero-retention registry we check; the rest are unknown to us rather than confirmed either way.
What each host's API supports
From the parameter list each endpoint publishes. Streaming is omitted: nothing we hold reports it, for any model.
- ✓
- Supported
- ✗
- Not supported
- Not published
- host gave no parameter list
| Provider | Tool calling | JSON output | Strict schema |
|---|---|---|---|
| Google Vertex AIglobal | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Google AI Studioflex | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| OpenRouter | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Google AI | |||
| Google AI Studio | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Google AI Studiopriority | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
Tool calling: 5 of 6 listings say yes, 1 publishes no parameter list. JSON output: 5 of 6 listings say yes, 1 publishes no parameter list. Strict schema: 5 of 6 listings say yes, 1 publishes no parameter list.
Models people weigh against Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite
When we formed this view
Dates behind this page
Prices last checked 9d ago
What we do not know about this model yet
- 1 of 6 listings publish no parameter list, so what their API accepts is unknown to us.
- Nothing we hold says whether an endpoint streams, so we do not show it either way.
- 2 of 6 listings do not say whether they train on prompts.
Licence and identifiers
What the licence allowsWe hold no licence record for this model. Inside are the identifiers you need to pull it — its Hugging Face repo where we have one, our slug and a machine-readable card.
Licence
Commercial API terms. We hold no licence record for this model, so there is nothing to summarise here.
Identifiers
- Modality record
- text+image+file+audio+video->text
- Catalogue slug
- google-gemini-3-5-flash-lite