AI Models · Open-Source vs Paid

Gemma 4 26B A4B Open vs Muse Spark 1.1 Paid

Gemma 4 26B A4B vs Muse Spark 1.1 compared — price per token, context window, multimodality, openness and which to choose. Can the open-source model replace the paid one? Full 2026 breakdown.

Muse Spark 1.1 — full profile ›

Prices & specs refreshed from live data · olud.ai

Open-model prices = cheapest provider via OpenRouter; official maker rates may be higher.

Gemma 4 26B A4BOpenGoogle
$0.04 /M input
$0.22 /M outputNo per-token fees if you self-host
TypeOpen-weight
Context window262K tokens
MultimodalYes
Self-hostYes
Muse Spark 1.1PaidMeta
$1.25 /M input
$4.25 /M outputManaged API (no infra to run)
TypeProprietary
Context window1M tokens
MultimodalYes
Self-hostNo
Choose Gemma 4 26B A4B if you want to self-host, keep your data private and skip per-token fees — it's open-weight and runs on your own hardware. Choose Muse Spark 1.1 if you want frontier capability through a managed API with zero infrastructure to run.

Gemma 4 26B A4B vs Muse Spark 1.1 specs

SpecGemma 4 26B A4BMuse Spark 1.1Winner
MakerGoogleMeta–
TypeOpen-weightProprietaryGemma 4 26B A4B
Context window262K tokens1M tokensMuse Spark 1.1
Input price$0.04/M · free self-host$1.25/MGemma 4 26B A4B
Output price$0.22/M · free self-host$4.25/MGemma 4 26B A4B
Vision / multimodalYesYes= Tie
Tool / function callingYesYes= Tie
Self-hostableYesNo (API only)Gemma 4 26B A4B
LicenseGemma LicenseProprietaryGemma 4 26B A4B

Price gap & when to choose each

19×cheaper per output token

Gemma 4 26B A4B is ~19× cheaper than Muse Spark 1.1 on output tokens ($0.22 vs $4.25 per M tokens).

Choose Gemma 4 26B A4B if…
  • You want to self-host or run on your cloud
  • You prioritize data privacy & control
  • You want the lowest operating costs
  • You are building open or reproducible AI
Choose Muse Spark 1.1 if…
  • You want frontier performance through a managed API
  • You need the longer 1M context window
  • You value reliability & ecosystem
  • You don't want to manage infrastructure

Feature comparison

CapabilityGemma 4 26B A4BMuse Spark 1.1
Open weights (downloadable)✓✗
Self-hostable✓✗
Runs fully offline✓✗
Vision / multimodal✓✓
Tool / function calling✓✓
1M+ context window✗✓

Benchmarks: Gemma 4 26B A4B vs Muse Spark 1.1

Independent benchmark scores measured by Artificial Analysis. Higher is better (except latency).

Gemma 4 26B A4B delivers 5.4× more intelligence per dollar.
Gemma 4 26B A4B
Muse Spark 1.1
Intelligence index
16.7
34.3
Coding index
39.3
71.3
GPQA
79.2%
89.8%
Humanity's Last Exam
19.3%
46.2%
Long Context Reasoning
65.7%
77.7%
IFBench
72.4%
–
τ²-Bench
43.6%
–
τ-Bench Banking
12%
31.8%
Terminal-Bench
39%
77.9%
Terminal-Bench Hard
13.6%
–
SciCode
–
58.8%
Speed
0 tok/s
0 tok/s
Latency
0s
0s
Intelligence per $
93.3
17.2

Benchmark data by Artificial Analysis.

How Gemma 4 26B A4B and Muse Spark 1.1 score

🏆 Best value & openness: Gemma 4 26B A4B (4.8 vs 3.3 / 5)
CriterionGemma 4 26B A4BMuse Spark 1.1
Cost-efficiency5.04.0
Context window4.05.0
Openness5.01.5
Self-hosting5.01.0
Multimodality5.05.0

Scores come from live data — output price (cost), context length, open vs closed weights (openness & self-hosting) and vision/tool support (multimodality). Raw task quality isn't scored here; it depends on your benchmark — see the verdict.

What each model is

Gemma 4 26B A4B Open

Google · Open-weight

Gemma 4 26B A4B IT is an instruction-tuned Mixture-of-Experts (MoE) model from Google DeepMind. Despite 25.2B total parameters, only 3.8B activate per token during inference — delivering near-31B quality at...

Muse Spark 1.1 Paid

Meta · Proprietary

Muse Spark 1.1 is a multimodal reasoning model from Meta, built for agentic tasks. It accepts text, images, video, audio, and PDF documents and returns text, with a 1M-token context...

Other models in these families

These variants are tracked but not compared here — one page per family keeps the comparison readable.

Other variants tracked
Gemma 4 26B A4B (free)Gemma 4 31B (batch)Gemma 4 31BGemma 4 31B (free)Gemma 3 27BGemma 3 4BGemma 3 12BGemma 2 27B

Frequently asked questions

Is Gemma 4 26B A4B as good as Muse Spark 1.1?

Gemma 4 26B A4B is open-weight and competitive on many tasks, but Muse Spark 1.1 may still lead on the hardest reasoning and agentic work. The gap keeps narrowing — benchmark both on your actual use case before deciding.

Can I run Gemma 4 26B A4B locally?

Yes. Gemma 4 26B A4B has open weights, so you can self-host it on your own GPUs or run it via a low-cost API. Muse Spark 1.1 is API-only and cannot be self-hosted.

How much cheaper is Gemma 4 26B A4B?

Gemma 4 26B A4B costs $0.22/M output vs $4.25/M for Muse Spark 1.1 — roughly 19x cheaper via API, and free if you self-host.

Gemma 4 26B A4B vs Muse Spark 1.1 — which should I pick in 2026?

Choose Gemma 4 26B A4B if you want to self-host, keep your data private and skip per-token fees — it's open-weight and runs on your own hardware. Choose Muse Spark 1.1 if you want frontier capability through a managed API with zero infrastructure to run.

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