Noometry

Model comparison

Claude Sonnet 5 vs Gemma 4 26B A4B IT

Claude Sonnet 5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.6 to 43.5 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 4 26B A4B IT costs 37× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Last verified . 27 shared benchmarks.

Claude Sonnet 5 Anthropic

54.6

Rank #29 Confirmed

Gemma 4 26B A4B IT Google

43.5

Rank #92 Confirmed

Summary

  • They share 27 benchmarks with published results for both. Claude Sonnet 5 scores higher in 9 categories and Gemma 4 26B A4B IT in 0 categories; 8 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
  • The widest gap is in reasoning, where Claude Sonnet 5 leads 49.1 to 21.8.
  • The biggest single-benchmark swing is WeirdML: 68.8% for Claude Sonnet 5 and 35.2% for Gemma 4 26B A4B IT.
  • Gemma 4 26B A4B IT is cheaper at $0.0675 / $0.23 per million input/output tokens, against $2 / $10 for Claude Sonnet 5.
  • Claude Sonnet 5 accepts more context: 1M tokens versus 262K.
  • Gemma 4 26B A4B IT has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

Side by side

Claude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
ProviderAnthropicGoogle
Noometry Index54.643.5
Released2026-06-292026-04-02
WeightsProprietaryOpen
Context window1M262K
Max output128K33K
Input $ / M tokens$2$0.0675
Output $ / M tokens$10$0.23
Results tracked5128

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Category by category

Coding Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 55.5 (#26), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 39.0 (#164)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
LMArena WebDev15411359
SciCode54.3%40%
WeirdML68.8%35.2%
LMArena Coding14831447
ALE-Bench1,463927.17
DeepSWE53.8%—
FrontierCode42.7%—
CursorBench34.1%—
GSO37.3%—

Agentic & Tool Use Not comparable

Claude Sonnet 5: 42.8 (#18), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: —

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
APEX-Agents54.5%—
GBAEval65.3%—
LMArena Search1194—
Vending-Bench 26,378—

Reasoning Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 49.1 (#39), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 21.8 (#213)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
CritPt16.9%0%
Chess Puzzles35%6%
LMArena Hard Prompts14611439
DTBench92.5%74.9%
LMCA50%29.7%
Epoch Capabilities Index156.21141.85
SimpleBench60.6%—
NYT Connections (extended)75.1%—
Mystery Game Puzzles35%—
Surface Evolver Bench60%—
Bench to the Future 30.14—
ForecastBench61.1—

Math Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 66.2 (#27), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 47.6 (#67)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
OTIS Mock AIME 2024-202594.7%82.2%
LMArena Math14671470
FrontierMath (Tiers 1-3)65.6%—
FrontierMath Tier 429.3%—
ProofBench77%—

Knowledge Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 55.6 (#47), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 45.7 (#85)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
GPQA Diamond90.5%73.2%
LMArena Expert14901447
SimpleQA Verified33.7%—
Vectara Hallucination Rate—5.2%

Multimodal Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 42.4 (#31), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 40.6 (#46)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
LMArena Vision12741260
Blueprint-Bench 224.9%—
LMArena Document1466—

Multilingual Too close to call

Claude Sonnet 5: 53.8 (#55), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 53.1 (#71)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
LMArena Non-English14311421
LMArena Chinese14771495
LMArena French14601460
LMArena Russian14511434
LMArena Spanish14371417
LMArena German1440—
LMArena Japanese1422—
LMArena Korean1411—

Instruction Following Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 76.3 (#41), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 74.8 (#82)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
LMArena Instruction Following14521420

Long Context Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 44.8 (#55), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 43.6 (#91)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
LMArena Longer Query14631428

Writing & Preference Claude Sonnet 5 leads

Claude Sonnet 5: 69.2 (#25), Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 58.6 (#115)

BenchmarkClaude Sonnet 5Gemma 4 26B A4B IT
LMArena Text14421434
LMArena Creative Writing14161402
EQ-Bench Creative Writing17941305
LMArena Multi-Turn14541441
EQ-Bench 41236—

Frequently asked questions

Is Claude Sonnet 5 better than Gemma 4 26B A4B IT?

Claude Sonnet 5 is the stronger model overall, scoring 54.6 to 43.5 on the Noometry Index. Gemma 4 26B A4B IT costs 37× less per token, which makes it the better buy when Claude Sonnet 5's lead doesn't matter for your workload.

Which is cheaper, Claude Sonnet 5 or Gemma 4 26B A4B IT?

Gemma 4 26B A4B IT is cheaper. It lists at $0.0675 per million input tokens and $0.23 per million output tokens; Claude Sonnet 5 lists at $2 and $10.

Is Claude Sonnet 5 or Gemma 4 26B A4B IT better for coding?

Claude Sonnet 5 scores higher on coding benchmarks: 55.5 versus 39.0 in the Noometry coding category.

Which has the bigger context window?

Claude Sonnet 5 does, with 1M tokens against 262K.

How many benchmarks do Claude Sonnet 5 and Gemma 4 26B A4B IT share?

27 benchmarks have published results for both models. Claude Sonnet 5 has 51 scored results on Noometry and Gemma 4 26B A4B IT has 28.

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