Gemma 4 12B vs GPT-5.6 Sol
Head-to-head specifications
| Metric | Gemma 4 12B | GPT-5.6 Sol | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence Index | 26.0 | 59.0 | -55.9% |
| Context window | 400K tokens | 1M tokens | — |
| Blended price ($/1M tokens) | $0.12 | $1.54 | -92.2% |
| Output speed (tokens/s) | 110 | 57 | +93.0% |
| Access | Open weights | Proprietary API | — |
- GPT-5.6 Sol leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 59.0 vs 26.0).
- Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run at $0.12/1M blended tokens — about 12.8× cheaper.
- GPT-5.6 Sol offers the larger context window (1M tokens), useful for long documents and codebases.
Verdict: Gemma 4 12B or GPT-5.6 Sol?
Gemma 4 12B advantages
- Affordability (+92%)
- Output speed (+48%)
GPT-5.6 Sol advantages
- General intelligence (+56%)
- Context window (+60%)
Which should you choose?
- Choose the Gemma 4 12B if you want the lowest cost per token at scale.
- Choose the GPT-5.6 Sol if you need the strongest overall reasoning and accuracy.
- Choose the Gemma 4 12B if low latency and fast generation matter for your application.
Value for money
Gemma 4 12B offers more intelligence per dollar (5.7× 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.
Gemma 4 12B vs GPT-5.6 Sol: which should you choose?
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).
GPT-5.6 Sol — OpenAI multimodal model with an Intelligence Index of 59, a 1M-token context window and a blended price of $1.54/1M tokens.
Gemma 4 12B vs GPT-5.6 Sol: GPT-5.6 Sol scores higher on the Intelligence Index. GPT-5.6 Sol leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 59.0 vs 26.0). Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run at $0.12/1M blended tokens — about 12.8× cheaper.
Capability: intelligence, coding and agentic work
On the composite Intelligence Index the GPT-5.6 Sol scores 59.0 versus 26.0. Composite indices summarize many evaluations, but always test on your own workload before committing.
Context window and speed
The GPT-5.6 Sol 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 57 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 $1.54 per 1M tokens). Gemma 4 12B is open weights and GPT-5.6 Sol is proprietary api. 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 Gemma 4 12B better than the GPT-5.6 Sol?
These two are closely matched — the right pick comes down to which specific strengths you value and the price you actually pay. GPT-5.6 Sol leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 59.0 vs 26.0).
What is the main difference between the Gemma 4 12B and the GPT-5.6 Sol?
GPT-5.6 Sol leads overall capability (Intelligence Index 59.0 vs 26.0). Gemma 4 12B is the cheaper model to run at $0.12/1M blended tokens — about 12.8× cheaper.
Which is better value?
Gemma 4 12B offers more intelligence per dollar (5.7× 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 Gemma 4 12B if you want the lowest cost per token at scale. Choose the GPT-5.6 Sol if you need the strongest overall reasoning and accuracy.
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.