Compare / Nanbeige4.2 3B vs Gemma 3n E2B
Nanbeige4.2 3B vs Gemma 3n E2B
Updated November 2026
Verdict
Nanbeige4.2 3B scores higher on the Small LM Index: 70.4 vs 14.3. On the 2 benchmarks both labs report, Nanbeige4.2 3B wins 2 and Gemma 3n E2B wins 0. Both need about 4 GB of memory at 4-bit quantization. Neither model has a hosted API on OpenRouter, so you would run both yourself.
Pick Nanbeige4.2 3B if…
- you want the strongest model overall
- you mostly write code
- you work with long documents
- you need a permissive license (Apache-2.0)
- you want the more widely used model (more quantized builds and community support)
Pick Gemma 3n E2B if…
- you need image input
Specifications
| Nanbeige4.2 3B | Gemma 3n E2B | |
|---|---|---|
| Small LM Index | 70.4 (likely 69–72) | 14.3 (likely 12–17) |
| Lab | Nanbeige (Kanzhun) · China | Google · United States |
| Released | 2026-07-21 | 2025-06-26 |
| Parameters | 4.2B (dense) | 5.4B (dense) |
| Memory at 4-bit | ~3.8 GB | ~4 GB |
| Context window | 262K tokens | 32K tokens |
| Input | text | text, image, audio, video |
| Reasoning | Always thinks | No thinking |
| License | Apache-2.0 | Gemma |
| API price / 1M tokens | Self-host only | Self-host only |
| Hugging Face downloads (30 days) | 120.3K | 38.3K |
Benchmarks
Higher is better. Bold marks the winner where both labs report a score. ≈ marks the index model's estimate for a score that wasn't reported, ✓ an independent measurement and * a score measured by another lab.
| Benchmark | Nanbeige4.2 3B | Gemma 3n E2B |
|---|---|---|
| MMLU-Pro Knowledge | ≈ 85 | 40.5 |
| GPQA Diamond Knowledge | 87.4 | 24.8 |
| Humanity's Last Exam Reasoning | 17.8 | ≈ 1 |
| AIME Math | ≈ 93 | 6.7 |
| LiveCodeBench Coding | 72.5 | 18.6 |
| SWE-bench Verified Coding | 63.6 | ≈ 3 |
| Terminal-Bench Agentic | 44.1 | — |
| MMLU Knowledge | — | 60.1 |
| Multilingual MMLU Multilingual | — | 55.1 |
| HMMT Math | 82.8 | — |
| AA-LCR Long context | 58.7 | — |
Scores are mostly reported by each lab with its own settings, so small gaps are noise. See the methodology. Open in the interactive comparison to add more models.
Questions
Which is better, Nanbeige4.2 3B or Gemma 3n E2B?
Nanbeige4.2 3B scores higher on the Small LM Index: 70.4 vs 14.3. On the 2 benchmarks both labs report, Nanbeige4.2 3B wins 2 and Gemma 3n E2B wins 0.
Which is cheaper to run?
Neither model has a hosted API on OpenRouter, so you would run both yourself. Both need about 4 GB of memory at 4-bit quantization.
Which has the longer context window?
Nanbeige4.2 3B has the longer context window: 262K tokens against 32K.
Can I use Nanbeige4.2 3B and Gemma 3n E2B commercially?
Nanbeige4.2 3B is released under Apache-2.0 and Gemma 3n E2B under Gemma. Apache 2.0 and MIT allow commercial use; other licenses can add conditions, so read the license before shipping a product.