Introducing Gemma 4 12B: a unified, encoder-free multimodal model
What changed
Introducing Gemma 4 12B: a unified, encoder-free multimodal model Today, we are introducing Gemma 4 12B, our latest model designed to bring agentic multimodal intelligence directly to laptops. Bridging the gap between our edge-friendly E4B and our more advanced 26B Mixture of Experts (MoE), Gemma 4 12B packages powerful capabilities inside a reduced memory footprint. - Open and accessible: Released under an Apache 2.0 license with support across the developer ecosystem.
Why it matters
A concrete addition to Practical AI: Tools, Models & Frameworks: it changes what's available to builders today rather than being general commentary.
How it compares
Related prior coverage to compare against:
- Introducing Mellum2: A 12B Mixture-of-Experts Model by JetBrains
- Welcome Gemma 4: Frontier multimodal intelligence on device
- Transformer-based Encoder-Decoder Models
Sources
- Introducing Gemma 4 12B: a unified, encoder-free multimodal model (deepmind-blog)primary