Claude Fable 5 vs Gemma 4 12B
Head-to-head specifications
| Metric | Claude Fable 5 | Gemma 4 12B | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence Index | 60.0 | 26.0 | +130.8% |
| Context window | 1M tokens | 400K tokens | — |
| Blended price ($/1M tokens) | $1.68 | $0.12 | +1,300.0% |
| Output speed (tokens/s) | 65 | 110 | -40.9% |
| Access | Proprietary API | Open weights | — |
- Claude Fable 5 leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 60.0 vs 26.0).
- Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run at $0.12/1M blended tokens — about 14.0× cheaper.
- Claude Fable 5 offers the larger context window (1M tokens), useful for long documents and codebases.
Verdict: Claude Fable 5 or Gemma 4 12B?
Claude Fable 5 advantages
- General intelligence (+57%)
- Context window (+60%)
Gemma 4 12B advantages
- Affordability (+93%)
- Output speed (+41%)
Which should you choose?
- Choose the Claude Fable 5 if you need the strongest overall reasoning and accuracy.
- Choose the Gemma 4 12B if you want the lowest cost per token at scale.
- Choose the Claude Fable 5 if you work with long documents or large codebases.
Value for money
Gemma 4 12B offers more intelligence per dollar (6.1× the Intelligence-Index-per-cost of the alternative), making it the stronger value for high-volume use. It is also open-weight, so self-hosting can reduce costs further at scale.
Claude Fable 5 vs Gemma 4 12B: which should you choose?
Claude Fable 5 — Anthropic multimodal model with an Intelligence Index of 60, a 1M-token context window and a blended price of $1.68/1M tokens.
Gemma 4 12B — Google text model with an Intelligence Index of 26, a 400K-token context window and a blended price of $0.12/1M tokens (open weights).
Claude Fable 5 vs Gemma 4 12B: Claude Fable 5 scores higher on the Intelligence Index. Claude Fable 5 leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 60.0 vs 26.0). Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run at $0.12/1M blended tokens — about 14.0× cheaper.
Capability: intelligence, coding and agentic work
On the composite Intelligence Index the Claude Fable 5 scores 60.0 versus 26.0. Composite indices summarize many evaluations, but always test on your own workload before committing.
Context window and speed
The Claude Fable 5 accepts up to 1 million tokens per request, which sets how much documentation, transcript or code it can reason over at once. In measured throughput, Gemma 4 12B generates faster (110 vs 65 tokens/s), which matters for interactive apps and high-volume pipelines.
Pricing and access
At blended per-token rates, Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run ($0.12 vs $1.68 per 1M tokens). Claude Fable 5 is proprietary api and Gemma 4 12B is open weights. Open-weight models can be self-hosted, trading per-call cost for infrastructure you manage; for production also weigh rate limits, throughput and data-residency requirements.
The verdict
Both are credible choices in the ai model comparison space; the specification table above lays out every metric so you can weigh the trade-offs that matter to you. Pick the one whose strengths line up with how you will actually use it.
Frequently asked questions
Is the Claude Fable 5 better than the Gemma 4 12B?
These two are closely matched — the right pick comes down to which specific strengths you value and the price you actually pay. Claude Fable 5 leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 60.0 vs 26.0).
What is the main difference between the Claude Fable 5 and the Gemma 4 12B?
Claude Fable 5 leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 60.0 vs 26.0). Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run at $0.12/1M blended tokens — about 14.0× cheaper.
Which is better value?
Gemma 4 12B offers more intelligence per dollar (6.1× the Intelligence-Index-per-cost of the alternative), making it the stronger value for high-volume use. It is also open-weight, so self-hosting can reduce costs further at scale.
Which should I choose?
Choose the Claude Fable 5 if you need the strongest overall reasoning and accuracy. Choose the Gemma 4 12B if you want the lowest cost per token at scale.
Methodology
Large language models are compared on independent leaderboard metrics: an Intelligence Index (a composite of reasoning and knowledge evaluations), Coding and Agentic indices where measured, community arena Elo, maximum context window, a blended API price per million tokens (weighted across cache-hit, input and output rates), and measured output speed in tokens per second. Where a model ships multiple reasoning-effort variants, we report its strongest variant. Benchmarks capture only part of real-world quality, which also depends on tool use, latency, safety and task fit — and this space moves quickly, so figures reflect the leaderboard snapshot on the page date.