# Gemma 4 26B A4B IT vs Step 5 Preview

> Gemma 4 26B A4B IT and Step 5 Preview score almost the same on the Noometry Index (43.1 vs 43.8), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.

- Canonical page: https://noometry.com/compare/gemma-4-26b-a4b-it-vs-step-5-preview
- Last updated: 2026-10-10
- Shared benchmarks: 3

## Summary

- They share 3 benchmarks with published results for both. Gemma 4 26B A4B IT scores higher in 0 categories and Step 5 Preview in 2 categories; 2 gaps are clear of the uncertainty.
- The widest gap is in reasoning, where Step 5 Preview leads 38.0 to 21.1.
- The biggest single-benchmark swing is CritPt: 0% for Gemma 4 26B A4B IT and 20.9% for Step 5 Preview.
- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT is cheaper at $0.0765 / $0.26 per million input/output tokens, against $1 / $2.70 for Step 5 Preview.
- Step 5 Preview accepts more context: 1.02M tokens versus 262K.
- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT has downloadable open weights; the other is API-only.

## Snapshot

| | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| Provider | Google | StepFun |
| Noometry Index | 43.1 | 43.8 |
| Rank | 88 | 78 |
| Context | 262K | 1.02M |
| Input $/M | $0.0765 | $1 |
| Output $/M | $0.26 | $2.70 |
| Weights | Open | Proprietary |

## Coding

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 38.8 (#156)
- Step 5 Preview: 50.6 (#40)

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena WebDev | 1359 | 1569 |
| SciCode | 40% | 58.9% |
| WeirdML | 35.2% | — |
| LMArena Coding | 1446 | — |
| ALE-Bench | 927.17 | — |

## Reasoning

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 21.1 (#205)
- Step 5 Preview: 38.0 (#58)

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| CritPt | 0% | 20.9% |
| Chess Puzzles | 6% | — |
| LMArena Hard Prompts | 1438 | — |
| DTBench | 74.9% | — |
| LMCA | 29.7% | — |
| Epoch Capabilities Index | 141.85 | — |

## Math

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 45.7 (#61)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| OTIS Mock AIME 2024-2025 | 82.2% | — |
| LMArena Math | 1469 | — |

## Knowledge

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 45.6 (#79)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| GPQA Diamond | 73.2% | — |
| Vectara Hallucination Rate | 5.2% | — |
| LMArena Expert | 1447 | — |

## Multimodal

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 39.9 (#43)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Vision | 1260 | — |

## Multilingual

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 53.3 (#68)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Non-English | 1422 | — |
| LMArena Chinese | 1495 | — |
| LMArena French | 1459 | — |
| LMArena Russian | 1434 | — |
| LMArena Spanish | 1415 | — |

## Instruction Following

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 75.0 (#78)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Instruction Following | 1420 | — |

## Long Context

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 43.6 (#87)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Longer Query | 1427 | — |

## Writing & Preference

- Gemma 4 26B A4B IT: 58.8 (#110)
- Step 5 Preview: —

| Benchmark | Gemma 4 26B A4B IT | Step 5 Preview |
|---|---|---|
| LMArena Text | 1434 | — |
| LMArena Creative Writing | 1401 | — |
| EQ-Bench Creative Writing | 1305 | — |
| LMArena Multi-Turn | 1442 | — |

## FAQ

### Is Gemma 4 26B A4B IT better than Step 5 Preview?

Gemma 4 26B A4B IT and Step 5 Preview score almost the same on the Noometry Index (43.1 vs 43.8), so choose on price, context window or the category you care about most.

### Which is cheaper, Gemma 4 26B A4B IT or Step 5 Preview?

Gemma 4 26B A4B IT is cheaper. It lists at $0.0765 per million input tokens and $0.26 per million output tokens; Step 5 Preview lists at $1 and $2.70.

### Is Gemma 4 26B A4B IT or Step 5 Preview better for coding?

Step 5 Preview scores higher on coding benchmarks: 50.6 versus 38.8 in the Noometry coding category.

### Which has the bigger context window?

Step 5 Preview does, with 1.02M tokens against 262K.

### How many benchmarks do Gemma 4 26B A4B IT and Step 5 Preview share?

3 benchmarks have published results for both models. Gemma 4 26B A4B IT has 28 scored results on Noometry and Step 5 Preview has 3.