Google launches Gemini 4 Hydrogen for everyday coding and agents at a flat $1.50/$7.50; default AA Index 51 vs Argon's 50

Why it matters

【Key points】

· Launch: Nov 12, 2026 post by Koray Kavukcuoglu (Google DeepMind SVP, Google Chief AI Architect). Hydrogen is the fast everyday coding and agent model; Carbon and Argon remain the frontier models.

· Price: Flat $1.50 / $7.50 per million input / output tokens across the 1M context. Model card: 1M context, 64K default synchronous output, up to 1M via background long decode; adapted from Carbon; cutoff March 2026.

• · Official scores: Default high 51 on the Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index vs Argon 50, 54 at xhigh.
• Versus 3.8 Flash: 2.5× faster, Terminal-Bench 4.1 57% vs 18.2%.
• Agent Arena #5; HLE-Diamond 58.8%; Vals Tax 52.3% (#1); Vals Legal 55.8% (tied #1).

· Orchestration: Four thinking levels (low / medium / high default / new xhigh). Antigravity Orchestrator can switch Carbon and Hydrogen in one session.

· Availability: Global today in the Gemini API / AI Studio, Antigravity (Pro / Ultra), Gemini for business, the Gemini app, and Google Search.

· Safety (vendor-reported): Versus 3.8 Flash, up to 81% less overreach, 79% less under-service, 12× fewer misaligned actions; 96.7% honesty eval.

【Our read】

Background

• We already covered Carbon GA and Argon.
• Hydrogen / Helix had only been a rumor.
• This official post plus a model card puts Gemini 4 in Search and the Gemini app.

Comparison

Officially the successor to 3.8 Flash, not a Carbon replacement. $1.50 / $7.50 is below Carbon’s current $2 / $10 intro ($4 / $20 from Dec 1).

Impact

First Gemini 4 rollout to everyone. Benches are vendor-reported; independent checks and the full safety report are still pending.

【Verifiable】

• · Main post (RSS 2026-11-12T18:00:00Z)
• · Model card
• · Search companion