Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) vs GPT-6 Astra (Max)
Which is better for the money: Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) by Google or GPT-6 Astra (Max) by OpenAI? Intelligence, total benchmark cost, and end-to-end time from Artificial Analysis & other sources, snapshot 2026-10-24.
Trade-off
Verdict
Depends on your budget
GPT-6 Astra (Max) scores 43.8 points higher (52.7 vs 8.9) but costs 363× as much to run the benchmark ($5324 vs $14.7; flagship vs budget cost classes). They are not alternatives at one budget: pick GPT-6 Astra (Max) when you need intelligence above 8.9, and Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) when 8.9 is enough.
| Metric | Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) | GPT-6 Astra (Max) | Difference |
|---|---|---|---|
| Intelligence (higher is better) | 8.9 | 52.7 | +492.1% GPT-6 Astra (Max) is 5.9× more intelligent |
| Total AA cost (lower is better) | $14.68 | $5,324.10 | +36167.7% GPT-6 Astra (Max) is 363× more expensive |
| End-to-end time (lower is better) | 57.75s | 275.53s | +377.1% GPT-6 Astra (Max) is 377.1% slower |
| Price per 1M tokens (in / out) | $0.02 / $0.10 | $10.0 / $50.0 | |
| Input modalities | Text, Image, Speech, Video | Text, Image |
GPT-6 Astra (Max) vs Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning): 492.1% more intelligence, 36167.7% more cost to run the AA benchmark, and 377.1% slower end-to-end.
Today's Pareto frontier
Against the frontier
- Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, GPT-6 Luna (Low) scores 21.50 for $10.6.
- GPT-6 Astra (Max) is off the frontier: at the same or lower cost, Claude Opus 5.5 (Xhigh, Default Fallback) scores 56.00 for $4057.
Gemma 4 E4B (Reasoning)GPT-6 Astra (Max)Today's Pareto frontierOpen-weights frontierEvery other model
Matchup
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Accept: text/markdown or ?format=md returns this page as Markdown. JSON: /api/v1/compare/gemma-4-e4b/gpt-6-astra · Markdown: /api/v1/compare/gemma-4-e4b/gpt-6-astra?format=md · llms.txt · agent skill