Gemini 3.6 Flash pricing, context and benchmark
Gemini 3.6 Flash is a high-efficiency model from Google for coding, agentic workflows, and web and app development.
Everything that matters, in one table
Context, pricing, cache, modalities and tooling, from the model registry and Artificial Analysis.
| Model | Gemini 3.6 Flash |
| Model ID | google/gemini-3.6-flash |
| Provider | |
| Release date | 21 July 2026 |
| Status | Generally available |
| Input context | 1,048,576 tokens |
| Output context | 65,536 tokens |
| Official input pricing | $0.75 per 1M tokens |
| Official output pricing | $3.75 per 1M tokens |
| Cache read pricing | $0.15 per 1M tokens (80% off input) |
| Market input pricing | $0.375 per 1M (cheapest route) |
| Market output pricing | $1.875 per 1M (cheapest route) |
| Highest route pricing | $1.35 in, $6.75 out per 1M |
| Input modalities | text · image · video · file · audio |
| Output modalities | text |
| Reasoning control | Not exposed |
| Tool support | Text generation only |
| Tokenizer | Gemini |
| Provider routes | 7 endpoints |
| Artificial Analysis index | Not published |
| Speed | 170 tokens/s, 12.32s to first token |
| Knowledge cutoff | Not publicly stated |
Input and output support
| Modality | Input | Output | Billed at |
|---|---|---|---|
| Text | ✓ yes | ✓ yes | $0.75 in |
| Image | ✓ yes | no | $0.75 in |
| Audio | ✓ yes | no | $0.75 in |
| Video | ✓ yes | no | $0.75 in |
| File (PDF) | ✓ yes | no | $0.75 in |
What is Gemini 3.6 Flash?
Gemini 3.6 Flash is a high-efficiency model from Google for coding, agentic workflows, and web and app development.
It is designed to produce polished outputs with fewer unnecessary edits and...
Gemini 3.6 Flash carries a 1.05M token window, uses the Gemini tokenizer and is served by Google. On Hoodgen it sits in the Fast tier of the model menu next to its siblings, so you can switch mid conversation without losing the thread.
Release and what changed from the previous version
| Property | Gemini 3.5 Flash Lite | Gemini 3.6 Flash | Change |
|---|---|---|---|
| Released | 2026 | 2026 | Same release window |
| Context | 1.05M | 1.05M | Unchanged |
| Max output | 66K | 66K | Unchanged |
| Input price | $0.3 | $0.75 | Higher |
| Output price | $2.5 | $3.75 | Higher |
| Input modalities | text, image, video, file, audio | text, image, video, file, audio | Unchanged |
| AA index | 12 | n/a | Newer benchmark run |
Features and capabilities
What can you do with Gemini 3.6 Flash?
Prompt caching and how to cut the bill
Cached input bills at $0.15 per million instead of $0.75, a 80% discount. Keep the system prompt and documents first and the changing question last, so every call hits the cache.
Gemini 3.6 Flash pricing
Official pricing
- $0.15 cached input
- 1.05M context
- text, image, video, file, audio input
- 7 routes on OpenRouter
- What Hoodgen routes to first
- Same model, lower bill
- Priority or premium tier
- Best under load
- Use for latency critical calls
Market pricing, every route
| Provider | Tier | Input | Output | Cache read | Uptime 24h |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| flex | $0.375 | $1.875 | $0.037 | 67.5% | |
| Google AI Studio | flex | $0.375 | $1.875 | $0.037 | 100.0% |
| Google AI Studio | standard | $0.75 | $3.75 | $0.075 | 100.0% |
| standard | $0.75 | $3.75 | $0.075 | 100.0% | |
| standard | $0.825 | $4.125 | $0.083 | 100.0% | |
| priority | $1.35 | $6.75 | $0.135 | 100.0% | |
| Google AI Studio | priority | $1.35 | $6.75 | $0.135 | 100.0% |
API pricing and cost calculator
| Rate | Per call | Total | Credits |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cheapest route | $0.0063 | $3.13 | 2975 |
| List price | $0.0134 | $6.71 | 6377 |
| Highest route | $0.0371 | $18.56 | 17635 |
API and developer information
| Model ID | google/gemini-3.6-flash |
| Endpoint | https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/chat/completions |
| Parameters | prompt and max_tokens |
| Streaming | Yes, server sent events |
| Modality string | text+image+file+audio+video->text |
| Max prompt tokens | 1,048,576 |
| Max completion tokens | 65,536 |
curl https://openrouter.ai/api/v1/chat/completions \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $OPENROUTER_API_KEY" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{
"model": "google/gemini-3.6-flash",
"messages": [{ "role": "user", "content": "Summarise this document." }],
"max_tokens": 1024
}'Model limitations
| Text only output | It cannot generate images, audio or video. Pair it with an image model on Hoodgen when you need visuals. |
| Output cap | 65,536 tokens per request. Long deliverables have to be chunked. |
| Benchmarks not published | Artificial Analysis does not publish an Intelligence Index for this release, so no benchmark score is claimed here. |
| Knowledge cutoff | The provider does not state a fixed cutoff for every release. Verify very recent events against search. |
| Depth ceiling | Fast tier: strong on throughput, weaker than flagship tiers on long multi step reasoning. |
Gemini 3.6 Flash vs other Google models
| Model | Context | Input /1M | Output /1M | AA index | Released |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gemini 3.6 Flash | 1.05M | $0.75 | $3.75 | n/a | 2026 |
| Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview | 1.05M | $2 | $12 | n/a | 2026 |
| Gemini 4 Argon | 1.05M | $2 | $10 | 50 | Oct 2026 |
| Gemini 4 Carbon | 1.05M | $2 | $10 | n/a | 2026 |
| Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview Custom Tools | 1.05M | $2 | $12 | n/a | 2026 |
| Nano Banana Pro (Gemini 3 Pro Image) | 131K | $2 | $12 | n/a | 2026 |
Privacy and data policy
- On Hoodgen, prompts and attachments answer that request and stay in your conversation history so you can reopen it. They are not used to train models.
- Requests route through OpenRouter to Google and are covered by that provider's API terms.
- Do not paste secrets or personal data you would not send to any hosted model.
Gemini 3.6 Flash questions, answered
Start chatting with Gemini 3.6 Flash
Free to try on Hoodgen AI, with a live credit estimate before every send. No API key, no setup.