audio model comparison

Gemini 3.5 Transcribe vs Gemini 3.8 Live

Gemini 3.5 Transcribe and Gemini 3.8 Live are both current audio models, from Google. Both cost $0.005 per audio minute.

Data verified October 13, 2026 · Dataset 2026-10-13

Side by side

Standard-tier prices in effect today. The better value in each row is highlighted.

Fact	Gemini 3.5 Transcribe	Gemini 3.8 Live
Price per audio minute	$0.005	$0.005
Artificial Analysis AA-WER v2	2.6 % WER (#4 of 6)	Not measured
Provider	Google	Google
Release date	August 26, 2026	September 15, 2026
Access	API only	API only
Context window	Not reported	Not reported
Max output	Not reported	Not reported
Input	audio	text, audio
Output	text	text, audio

Scores:Artificial Analysis · 2026-10-13

When to choose each

Gemini 3.5 Transcribe

Best for

Batch transcription with speaker labels
Multilingual meeting and call transcripts

Watch out for

One hour of audio per request, or 30 minutes with diarization or timestamps
Custom vocabulary cannot be combined with diarization or timestamps, and there is no Batch API

Full Gemini 3.5 Transcribe profile

Gemini 3.8 Live

Best for

Customer-facing voice agents that need natural turn-taking

Watch out for

Audio is billed per token; the per-minute figures are Google's equivalents ($0.005 input, $0.018 output)
No independent voice benchmark is recorded here

Full Gemini 3.8 Live profile

Gemini 3.5 Transcribe vs Gemini 3.8 Live FAQ

Which is cheaper, Gemini 3.5 Transcribe or Gemini 3.8 Live?

Both cost $0.005 per audio minute.

Production evaluation

Choosing between Gemini 3.5 Transcribe and Gemini 3.8 Live?

Public benchmarks narrow the shortlist. We run both on your own tasks, data and cost limits, then build the routing and review controls to run the winner in production.

A head-to-head evaluation on your real workload
Routing between models by cost and difficulty

Compare all models Discuss your evaluation