# Gemini 3.5 Flash — Google's I/O 2026 Model Rivals Flagship Frontier Models on Coding and Agentic Tasks at 4x the Speed

> Google's new Flash-tier model targets agentic coding at flagship quality and 4x the throughput.

- Org: Google DeepMind
- Date: 2026-05-19
- Category: model
- Source: https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/models-and-research/gemini-models/gemini-3-5/
- Canonical page: https://ai-tldr.dev/releases/google-gemini-3-5-flash/

Google opened its Gemini 3.5 series at I/O 2026 with the Flash model, live now in the Gemini app, Search, Antigravity, and the API. Google says it matches large flagship models on coding and agentic tasks while running 4x faster.

## What it is

Gemini 3.5 Flash is the first model in Google's Gemini 3.5 family, unveiled at I/O 2026. It is the speed-optimized tier, meant for high-volume, latency-sensitive work, but Google positions this generation as closing the gap with much larger flagship models on reasoning, coding, and agentic tasks. A bigger Gemini 3.5 Pro is in testing and due next month.

## How it works

Like prior Flash models it trades some raw scale for inference speed, but Google reports frontier-level scores: 76.2% on Terminal-Bench 2.1, 1656 Elo on GDPval-AA, 83.6% on MCP Atlas, and 84.2% on the CharXiv multimodal reasoning benchmark. Google says output runs 4x faster than other frontier models, which is the main lever for long-horizon agent loops where many sequential model calls add up.

## Why it matters

Agentic workflows make many model calls in sequence, so per-token speed and cost compound. A Flash-tier model that holds flagship-level accuracy lets developers run agents and coding tools without paying flagship latency or price. It shipped across Google's whole surface (app, Search, Antigravity, API, and enterprise) on day one.

## Who it's for

developers building agents and coding tools

## Try it

Use model gemini-3.5-flash in the Gemini API via Google AI Studio (ai.dev)

## Links

- [Announcement](https://blog.google/innovation-and-ai/models-and-research/gemini-models/gemini-3-5/)
- [Model Overview](https://deepmind.google/models/gemini/)
- [API Docs](https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/models)