Model Comparison
Codestral-22B vs Gemma 3 4BWhich is better in 2026?
Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Verdict: Codestral-22B vs Gemma 3 4B — which is better?
Codestral-22B (by Mistral AI) and Gemma 3 4B (by Google) are two of the AI models people compare most. Here is how they stack up on benchmarks, price and capabilities, and which one to pick in 2026.
Codestral-22B outperforms in 2 benchmarks (HumanEval, MBPP), while Gemma 3 4B is better at 0 benchmarks. Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Choose Codestral-22B if…
- you want the strongest raw capability — it leads on 2 of 2 shared benchmarks
Choose Gemma 3 4B if…
- you want the most recent training data — it shipped Mar 2025
Performance Benchmarks
Comparative analysis across standard metrics
Codestral-22B outperforms in 2 benchmarks (HumanEval, MBPP), while Gemma 3 4B is better at 0 benchmarks.
Codestral-22B significantly outperforms across most benchmarks.
Arena Performance
Human preference votes
Model Size
Parameter count comparison
Codestral-22B has 18.2B more parameters than Gemma 3 4B, making it 455.0% larger.
Context Window
Maximum input and output token capacity
Only Gemma 3 4B specifies input context (131,072 tokens). Only Gemma 3 4B specifies output context (131,072 tokens).
Input Capabilities
Supported data types and modalities
Gemma 3 4B supports multimodal inputs, whereas Codestral-22B does not.
Gemma 3 4B can handle both text and other forms of data like images, making it suitable for multimodal applications.
Codestral-22B
Gemma 3 4B
License
Usage and distribution terms
Codestral-22B is licensed under MNPL-0.1, while Gemma 3 4B uses Gemma.
License differences may affect how you can use these models in commercial or open-source projects.
MNPL-0.1
Open weights
Gemma
Open weights
Release Timeline
When each model was launched
Codestral-22B was released on 2024-05-29, while Gemma 3 4B was released on 2025-03-12.
Gemma 3 4B is 10 months newer than Codestral-22B.
May 29, 2024
2.0 years ago
Mar 12, 2025
1.2 years ago
9mo newerKnowledge Cutoff
When training data ends
Gemma 3 4B has a documented knowledge cutoff of 2024-08-01, while Codestral-22B's cutoff date is not specified.
We can confirm Gemma 3 4B's training data extends to 2024-08-01, but cannot make a direct comparison without Codestral-22B's cutoff date.
—
Aug 2024
Outputs Comparison
Key Takeaways
Codestral-22B
View detailsMistral AI
Gemma 3 4B
View detailsDetailed Comparison
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FAQ
Common questions about Codestral-22B vs Gemma 3 4B.