Google releases Gemini 3.8 Flash and Gemini 3.8 Flash Cyber
Confirmed
Importance: major (4 of 5)The takeaway
On 2 Sept 2026 Google made Gemini 3.8 Flash generally available — its fourth Flash model in ~106 days and, per Google, its most intelligent Flash model, tuned for long-horizon software engineering (over 70% on DeepSWE v1.1) at $0.75/$3.75 per 1M tokens (intro pricing).
Status
- Claim
Confirmed
- Our reporting
- High confidence
- Importance
- Major (4 of 5)
- Last verified
- 30 September 2026
Your AI and this story
- GPT-6 Astra125 days after its cutoff
- Claude Opus 5.564 days after its cutoff
- Gemini 4 Hydrogen155 days after its cutoff
- Grok 4.794 days after its cutoff
None of these four assistants can know about it. The closest, Claude Opus 5.5, stops 64 days before it.
Key facts
- GA on 2026-09-02; API model ID: gemini-3.8-flash
- Inputs: text, image, video, audio, PDF; output: text
- Context: 1,048,576 input tokens; 65,536 output tokens; thinking levels low/medium/high
- Price: $0.75 input / $3.75 output per 1M tokens through 2026-12-31, then $1.50 / $7.50 from 2027-01-01
- DeepSWE v1.1: over 70% (Fortune reports 74%) — Google says it beats most larger frontier models
- HLE-Verified: 54.9% (vs GPT-5.6 Sol 54.5%, Claude Opus 5 54.4%, Gemini 3.7 Flash 53.6%) per Google’s table
- Vals Finance Agent v2: 61.4% (vs Claude Opus 5 58.6%, GPT-5.6 Sol 53.8%) per Google’s table
- 3.8 Flash Cyber: 47.2% pass@1 on CWE-Bench (automated patching); >70% success on internal vulnerability-finding test across 20 languages; access via application-only ‘Fairwind Program’
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- Chrome Security reported 2.6x more correct vulnerability patches; Wiz reported +7.5–9.7% recall at 2.3–5.2x lower cost
- Fortune: 10th place on Artificial Analysis Intelligence Index; ~40% higher cost at high reasoning than predecessor; $2.36 vs $11.84 per task compared with Claude Opus 5
- Released three weeks after Gemini 3.7 Flash (2026-08-13)
- Fairwind Program (Sept 2): limited-access program giving vetted governments, Google Cloud customers and cyber partners Gemini 3.8 Flash Cyber with the CodeMender agent harness to find, verify and patch vulnerabilities; access is limited to in-house security/IR/pentest teams with MFA and similar safeguards; other Cloud customers can use CodeMender with public models
What happened
Google DeepMind released Gemini 3.8 Flash (GA) on 2 September 2026, calling it its “most intelligent Flash model, engineered for long-horizon software engineering”. It is available in Google AI Studio / Gemini API, Android Studio, Google Antigravity, Gemini Enterprise, the Gemini app (Pro/Ultra), AI Mode in Search and Google Sheets.
Alongside it came Gemini 3.8 Flash Cyber, a specialised model for autonomous vulnerability discovery and patching, gated behind an application-only “Fairwind Program” for trusted defenders. Google cited partner results: Chrome Security got 2.6x more correct patches, Wiz saw higher recall at much lower cost, and Google Cloud’s vulnerability research team found a critical bug in under two hours.
On the Gemini API it keeps the 1M-token context and multimodal inputs (text, image, video incl. YouTube URLs, audio, PDF), with configurable thinking levels, computer use (preview), search/Maps grounding, code execution, file search and structured output. Introductory pricing matches 3.7 Flash ($0.75/$3.75 per 1M tokens) until the end of 2026, then doubles.
Why it matters
Gemini 3.8 Flash caps an unusually fast cadence: 3.5 Flash (19 May), 3.6 Flash (21 Jul), 3.7 Flash (13 Aug), 3.8 Flash (2 Sep). Google’s own tables show a “Flash”-tier model matching or beating frontier models from OpenAI and Anthropic on some agentic/finance/reasoning benchmarks at a fraction of the price — while the flagship Gemini 3.5 Pro remained unreleased, which press framed as a sign of trouble at the top end. Cyber-specialised variants gated to vetted defenders have become a pattern across labs in 2026.
Sources
10 sources from 4 sites. Numbers match the chips in the text.
10 sources: 9 primary, 1 press
Primary
- Introducing Gemini 3.8 Flash and 3.8 Flash Cyber (Google blog)blog.google, official
- Gemini 3.8 Flash — Google DeepMind model page (benchmarks)deepmind.google, official
- Gemini 3.8 Flash model carddeepmind.google, official
- Gemini API model page: gemini-3.8-flashai.google.dev, docs
- Gemini API release notesai.google.dev, docs
- Gemini API pricingai.google.dev, docs
- Google DeepMind: Introducing Gemini 3.8 Flash and 3.8 Flash Cyberdeepmind.google, official
- Google: Proactive cyber defense for governments and enterprises (Fairwind Program)blog.google, official
- Google blog: See what 4 builders are making with Gemini 3.8 Flash (Sept 28)blog.google, official
Press
Changes
- Added DeepMind launch post and the Fairwind Program post
- Filed