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Baseten vs Google Gemini API

SEPT 2026 audit

A comparison of Baseten and Google Gemini API built from values read directly from each provider's own documentation, with the source recorded against every figure.

Updated 13 criteria comparedSources last checked

The short answer

Choose Baseten if…

Teams that want per-token APIs and dedicated GPUs from one vendor with no plan fee — minute-granularity billing means a model that runs for ten minutes costs ten minutes.

Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved

Choose Google Gemini API if…

Getting to a working prototype without a card, then staying on the cheapest frontier-adjacent rates in this set — $0.75 per million input tokens is well under half what Anthropic and OpenAI charge for their top models.

Editorial · Palash Bagchi · approved

Consider something else if…

  • Baseten: Its dedicated H100 works out at $6.50 an hour, roughly three times DeepInfra's, so steady GPU workloads pay a premium for the platform around them.
  • Google Gemini API: The rates are dated: they roughly double on 1 January 2027, free-tier content is used to improve Google's products, and rate limits are not published anywhere you can read before signing up.

7 sourced criteria separate them — see where, with sources, below.

Visit Baseten documentationVisit Google Gemini API documentation

No affiliate links, sponsored placements or paid rankings appear on this site. Ordering follows the sourced data and the stated criteria.

01.

At a glance.

CriterionBasetenGoogle Gemini API
Pricing
Pricing modelNo platform fee: per-token Model APIs for open models, and dedicated deployments billed per minute of compute with volume discounts. The Pro tier buys priority access to high-demand GPUs rather than a lower rate.Per million tokens, with dated price changes published in advance — the current Gemini 3.x rates are explicitly promotional through 31 December 2026 and roughly double on 1 January 2027. A free tier exists, and its content is used to improve Google's products where the paid tier's is not.
Inference
Input price, top model
$1.40 per million input tokens for GLM-5.3, with cached input at $0.14 and output at $4.40. GLM-5.2 Fast, a speed variant, is $2.10.
$0.75 per million input tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash through 31 December 2026, then $1.50. Gemini 3.1 Pro, still preview, is $2.00 for prompts up to 200k tokens and $4.00 above.
Output price, top model
$4.40 per million output tokens for GLM-5.3.
$3.75 per million output tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash through 31 December 2026, then $7.50. Thinking tokens are billed as output.
Input price, cheapest model
$0.10 per million input tokens for GPT OSS 120B, with output at $0.50. GLM-5.3-Flash is $0.15 in and $0.50 out.
$0.30 per million input tokens for Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite, with output at $2.50.
Context window
1,048K tokens on the DeepSeek V4 line and the GLM 5.2/5.3 family, the widest it serves; 262K on the Kimi K2 models, 200K on GLM 4.7 and 128K on GPT OSS 120B. Baseten's table publishes these in thousands, so the magnitude is 1,048,000 rather than the 1,048,576 a power-of-two reading would give — the vendor's own figure, not a conversion of it.
1,048,576 tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash. Read from the Vertex AI model card: the Gemini API docs build their model cards client-side and publish no figure a fetch can read.
Max output tokens
262K tokens on most models, and it is a separate ceiling from the context window rather than the remainder of it: DeepSeek V4 Flash 0731 allows 384K output inside a 1,048K window, while GLM 4.7, Nemotron Ultra and GPT OSS 120B cap output at their full context. The Inkling models are the outlier at 32K.
65,536 tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash, and Google counts thinking tokens as output.
Prompt cachingSupportedSupported
Rate limitsTwo limits, requests and tokens per minute, set by account status rather than spend: an unverified Basic account gets 15 RPM and 100,000 TPM, a verified Basic or Pro account 120 RPM and 500,000 TPM, Enterprise custom. Cached input counts toward TPM at full weight even though it is billed cheaper.Tied to a usage tier — Free, then Tier 1/2/3 unlocked by cumulative spend — and enforced as requests per minute, input tokens per minute and requests per day. Google publishes no numbers in the docs: limits are viewed in AI Studio and are stated not to be guaranteed.

Only criteria both providers publish appear here; a tinted cell marks a real difference. Criteria only one of them documents are listed below, and an absence there means we found no source — not that the feature is missing. How we source this.

The small bar above a value is inetGeek's own lean toward that side — computed from the same facts shown, never a number the provider published. See the picker below "The short answer" to weigh only the criteria you care about.

02.

Where they differ.

Pricing model

Baseten
No platform fee: per-token Model APIs for open models, and dedicated deployments billed per minute of compute with volume discounts. The Pro tier buys priority access to high-demand GPUs rather than a lower rate.
Google Gemini API
Per million tokens, with dated price changes published in advance — the current Gemini 3.x rates are explicitly promotional through 31 December 2026 and roughly double on 1 January 2027. A free tier exists, and its content is used to improve Google's products where the paid tier's is not.
Sources (2) →
  • Pricing — Baseten ↗

    “$0 per month, pay as you go [...] Only pay for the compute you use, down to the minute. Volume discounts available [...] Pro Unlimited autoscaling and priority compute access [...] Priority access to high-demand GPUs”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

  • Gemini Developer API Pricing ↗

    “Paid Tier, per 1M tokens in USD [...] $0.75 through December 31, 2026. $1.50 starting January 1, 2027. [...] Used to improve our products | Yes | No”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

Input price, top model

Baseten
$1.40 per million input tokens for GLM-5.3, with cached input at $0.14 and output at $4.40. GLM-5.2 Fast, a speed variant, is $2.10.
Google Gemini API
$0.75 per million input tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash through 31 December 2026, then $1.50. Gemini 3.1 Pro, still preview, is $2.00 for prompts up to 200k tokens and $4.00 above.
Sources (2) →
  • Pricing — Baseten ↗

    “GLM-5.3 GLM-5.3 $1.40 $1.40 $0.14 $0.14 $4.40 [...] GLM-5.2 Fast GLM-5.2 Fast $2.10 $2.10 $0.21”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

  • Gemini Developer API Pricing ↗

    “Gemini 3.8 Flash [...] Input price | Free of charge | $0.75 through December 31, 2026. $1.50 starting January 1, 2027. [...] Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview [...] Input price | Not available | $2.00, prompts <= 200k tokens $4.00, prompts > 200k tokens”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

Output price, top model

Baseten
$4.40 per million output tokens for GLM-5.3.
Google Gemini API
$3.75 per million output tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash through 31 December 2026, then $7.50. Thinking tokens are billed as output.
Sources (2) →
  • Pricing — Baseten ↗

    “GLM-5.3 GLM-5.3 $1.40 $1.40 $0.14 $0.14 $4.40”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

  • Gemini Developer API Pricing ↗

    “Output price (including thinking tokens) | Free of charge | $3.75 through December 31, 2026. $7.50 starting January 1, 2027.”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

Input price, cheapest model

Baseten
$0.10 per million input tokens for GPT OSS 120B, with output at $0.50. GLM-5.3-Flash is $0.15 in and $0.50 out.
Google Gemini API
$0.30 per million input tokens for Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite, with output at $2.50.
Sources (2) →
  • Pricing — Baseten ↗

    “GPT OSS 120B GPT OSS 120B $0.10 $0.10 - - $0.50 [...] GLM-5.3-Flash GLM-5.3-Flash $0.15 $0.15 $0.03 $0.03 $0.50”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

  • Gemini Developer API Pricing ↗

    “Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite [...] Input price | Free of charge | $0.30 (text / image / video / audio) Output price (including thinking tokens) | Free of charge | $2.50”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official pricing

Context window

Baseten

1,048K tokens on the DeepSeek V4 line and the GLM 5.2/5.3 family, the widest it serves; 262K on the Kimi K2 models, 200K on GLM 4.7 and 128K on GPT OSS 120B. Baseten's table publishes these in thousands, so the magnitude is 1,048,000 rather than the 1,048,576 a power-of-two reading would give — the vendor's own figure, not a conversion of it.

Google Gemini API

1,048,576 tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash. Read from the Vertex AI model card: the Gemini API docs build their model cards client-side and publish no figure a fetch can read.

Sources (2) →

Max output tokens

Baseten

262K tokens on most models, and it is a separate ceiling from the context window rather than the remainder of it: DeepSeek V4 Flash 0731 allows 384K output inside a 1,048K window, while GLM 4.7, Nemotron Ultra and GPT OSS 120B cap output at their full context. The Inkling models are the outlier at 32K.

Google Gemini API

65,536 tokens for Gemini 3.8 Flash, and Google counts thinking tokens as output.

Sources (2) →

Rate limits

Baseten
Two limits, requests and tokens per minute, set by account status rather than spend: an unverified Basic account gets 15 RPM and 100,000 TPM, a verified Basic or Pro account 120 RPM and 500,000 TPM, Enterprise custom. Cached input counts toward TPM at full weight even though it is billed cheaper.
Google Gemini API
Tied to a usage tier — Free, then Tier 1/2/3 unlocked by cumulative spend — and enforced as requests per minute, input tokens per minute and requests per day. Google publishes no numbers in the docs: limits are viewed in AI Studio and are stated not to be guaranteed.
Sources (2) →
  • Pricing and limits — Baseten Docs ↗

    “Basic (unverified) | 15 | 100,000 | Basic (verified) | 120 | 500,000 | Pro | 120 | 500,000 [...] Cached and uncached input tokens count equally toward this limit, even though cached tokens cost less.”

    Read 2026-09-07 · official docs

  • Rate limits — Gemini API ↗

    “Rate limits depend on a variety of factors (such as your usage tier) and can be viewed in Google AI Studio. [...] Specified rate limits are not guaranteed and actual capacity may vary. [...] Usage tier | Qualification | Billing tier cap Free | Active project or free trial | N/A Tier 1 | Set up and link an active billing account | $250”

    Read 2026-09-06 · official docs

When these numbers change, hear about it. Sources are re-checked monthly; a repricing goes out as a short note.

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03.

Documented by only one.

These criteria are published by one provider and not the other. An absence here means we have not found a source, not that the feature is missing.

Free tierGoogle Gemini API: Yes
Entry paid planBaseten: $0 per month on the Basic plan — pay as you go, with dedicated deployments, model APIs and training included rather than gated behind a fee.
Batch discountGoogle Gemini API: 50% off through the Batch API, which is a paid-tier feature.
H100 SXM, per GPU-hourBaseten: $6.50 per hour for a dedicated H100 80GB. Baseten publishes $0.10833 per MINUTE — the hourly figure is that times 60, ours rather than Baseten's, and the page offers an hourly toggle. A100 80GB is $0.06667 a minute and B200 $0.16633.
Largest GPU offeredBaseten: 180GB per GPU on a B200, at $0.16633 per minute — $9.98 an hour.
04.

Questions this comparison answers.

Should I choose Baseten or Google Gemini API?

Pick Baseten if Teams that want per-token APIs and dedicated GPUs from one vendor with no plan fee — minute-granularity billing means a model that runs for ten minutes costs ten minutes.

Pick Google Gemini API if Getting to a working prototype without a card, then staying on the cheapest frontier-adjacent rates in this set — $0.75 per million input tokens is well under half what Anthropic and OpenAI charge for their top models.

Provider pages

BasetenModel inference platform with per-token APIs for open models and dedicated deployments billed by the minute.Google Gemini APIHosted inference for the Gemini model family, with a free tier and per-million-token paid pricing.

Related comparisons

Anthropic vs Google Gemini APIBaseten vs AnthropicBaseten vs DeepSeekBaseten vs Fireworks AIBaseten vs Novita AIBaseten vs OpenAIDeepInfra vs BasetenDeepInfra vs Google Gemini API

Every page here is sourced and dated.