Gemma 4 alternatives, graded
thecontinuitylayer.com/alternatives/gemma-42 of the 11 open models on the record score higher than Gemma 4's 6 of 7 (grade A−): MiMo-V2.6-Pro (6½, A), Phi-4-reasoning-vision-15B (6½, A), DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash (5½, B+) lead the ranking. Every grade is read from the maker's own page, checked 3 November 2026, never from a review.
Every open model on the record, ranked
Gemma 4’s own row is shaded. The five columns are the tests a person switching asks about first; each product page has every test, with the maker’s line and the source. Where the test is about training, no is the good answer and is colored as such.
| open model | Grade | License | Download | Runs locally | Hosted price | Training |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MiMo-V2.6-Pro#1 · Xiaomi | A6½/7 | |||||
| Phi-4-reasoning-vision-15B#2 · Microsoft | A6½/7 | |||||
| Gemma 4#3 · Google DeepMind · this one | A−6/7 | |||||
| DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash#4 · DeepSeek | B+5½/7 | |||||
| Mistral Large 4#5 · Mistral AI | B5/7 | |||||
| gpt-oss-120b#6 · OpenAI | B5/7 | |||||
| NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 Lightning#7 · NVIDIA | B5/7 | |||||
| Kimi K3#8 · Moonshot AI | B−4½/7 | |||||
| Qwen3.8#9 · Alibaba (Qwen) | B−4½/7 | |||||
| GLM-5.3#10 · Z.ai | C4/7 | |||||
| Muse Spark Open#11 · Meta | C−3½/7 | |||||
| Olmo 3.1 32B#12 · Ai2 (Allen Institute for AI) | C−3½/7 |
- License · Is it under an open license?
- Download · Can you download its weights?
- Runs locally · Does the maker say what it takes to run it on your own machine?
- Hosted price · Does the maker publish a price for its hosted it?
- Training · Does the maker train on your prompts when you use its hosted it?
Gemma 4 alternatives, by what matters
5 open models under an open license
Gemma 4 passes this test too.
10 open models whose weights download without a form
- A MiMo-V2.6-Pro
- A Phi-4-reasoning-vision-15B
- B+ DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash
- B Mistral Large 4
- B gpt-oss-120b
- B NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 Lightning
- B− Kimi K3
- B− Qwen3.8
- C GLM-5.3
- C− Olmo 3.1 32B
Gemma 4 passes this test too.
6 open models with a published hosted price
Gemma 4's grade on this test: partly.
2 open models whose maker says hosted prompts are not used for training
Gemma 4's grade on this test: partly.
What Google DeepMind changed lately
Google made Gemini Omni 1.2 Flash, its video generation model, generally available in the Gemini API on 5 November 2026 at $0.07 per second of 720p video, which Google says is 30% below the price of Gemini Omni 1.1. Clips can run up to 15 seconds, up from 10. The announcement gives no retirement date for Omni 1.1.
sourceGoogle emailed Google AI Plus subscribers ($4.99 a month) that from November 13, 2026, Pro models in the Gemini app and in AI Mode in Search will only be available on Google AI Pro ($19.99 a month) and above. Plus keeps the Flash and Flash-Lite models; earlier Pro chats can be continued with a different model.
sourceGoogle Cloud stopped selling new Gemini Code Assist Standard and Enterprise subscriptions and points buyers to Antigravity via Gemini Enterprise. Renewals are allowed until January 31, 2027 (annual) or December 31, 2027 (monthly).
source
Alternatives to the others
- MiMo-V2.6-Pro alternatives
- Phi-4-reasoning-vision-15B alternatives
- DeepSeek-V4.1-Flash alternatives
- Mistral Large 4 alternatives
- gpt-oss-120b alternatives
- NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 Lightning alternatives
- Kimi K3 alternatives
- Qwen3.8 alternatives
- GLM-5.3 alternatives
- Muse Spark Open alternatives
- Olmo 3.1 32B alternatives
The whole shelf: Open models. How the grades are made: How we grade. No maker pays for a place or a grade.