Google Releases Gemini 4 Hydrogen in Search and the Gemini App, Replacing Gemini 3.8 Flash

Google has released Gemini 4 Hydrogen, a fast and efficient model in its Gemini 4 family. It replaces Gemini 3.8 Flash and is rolling out now in Google Search, the Gemini app, Google Sheets, and Google's developer tools. Google says Hydrogen finishes tasks 2.5 times faster than Gemini 3.8 Flash.

Hydrogen joins the heavier Gemini 4 Carbon and Gemini 4 Argon models. Google says it is built for everyday work, coding, and agentic tasks that do not need deep reasoning.

Where Gemini 4 Hydrogen Is Available

Hydrogen now powers responses in Google Search for all users worldwide. In the Gemini app, it appears in the model menu, and free users are routed to it automatically when Gemini decides it suits the prompt. Availability by product:

• Google Search: all users, globally
• Gemini app: in the model menu, used automatically for free users
• Google Sheets: Google AI Pro, Ultra, and eligible Workspace users
• Google Antigravity: Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers
• Developers: Google AI Studio, Android Studio, and the Gemini API

In Search, Google says Hydrogen handles multi part questions and typos better and gives more visual answers. Search results will also show a wider range of links to websites.

In the Gemini app, Google says Hydrogen follows formatting, tone, and other instructions more closely, and keeps following them through longer conversations. It also works better with connected apps such as Gmail, Google Drive, Dropbox, and Airtable, and picks the right tool more often for multi step tasks. In Sheets, Google says it turns financial data into interactive forecasting models more than 30 percent faster than before.

Gemini 4 Hydrogen Benchmarks and API Price

Hydrogen scores 51 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index at its default thinking level, one point ahead of Gemini 4 Argon at 50, and 54 at its highest setting. It offers four thinking levels: low, medium, high, and a new xhigh level. Users pay in time and tokens only for the depth they choose.

For developers, the model has a 1 million token context window and costs:

1. $1.50 per million input tokens
2. $7.50 per million output tokens

A new Orchestrator feature in Google Antigravity switches between Gemini 4 Carbon for planning and Hydrogen for execution. Google says this cuts quota usage by 24 percent and speeds up tasks by nearly 20 percent.

Google also published safety figures. It says Hydrogen reduces agentic overreach by up to 81 percent compared with Gemini 3.8 Flash, cuts misaligned shortcuts by 12 times, is up to twice as unlikely to bypass permission restrictions, and reached a 96.7 percent honesty rate in internal agent tests.

Hydrogen is free to use in Search and the Gemini app. Google has not said when Gemini 3.8 Flash will be removed from the API.