---
title: "Augure vs Gemini: Canadian handling versus Google scale"
description: "For Canadian teams weighing Gemini for Workspace or the Gemini API against Augure: where data goes, what trains on it, CAD pricing, and a migration guide."
competitor: "Gemini for Google Workspace and the Gemini API"
vendor: "Google"
category: "chat"
canonical: "https://augureai.ca/compare/gemini"
updated: "2026-10-27"
summary: "Gemini gives you Google's models inside Workspace and an API with EU or US data regions; Augure stores customer data in Canada, runs inference on Canadian infrastructure and vetted EU partners, never US providers, and bills in CAD."
faqs:
  - q: "Does Gemini for Google Workspace keep my data in Canada?"
    a: "Not as a region setting. Per Google's Workspace Updates posts of June 9, 2025 and June 29, 2026, admins on Enterprise Plus and similar editions can choose EU or US storage and processing, or both. Canada is not one of the listed data region choices. Augure stores customer data in Canada and can set an account to Canada-only."
  - q: "Does Google train on my Gemini prompts?"
    a: "It depends on the product. Google's Workspace privacy hub says customer data is not used to train models without the customer's permission. The Gemini API terms (effective March 23, 2026) say unpaid-tier content may be used to improve products and read by human reviewers, and paid-tier content is not. Augure never uses customer data to train models."
  - q: "Can I move from the Gemini API to Augure without rewriting my code?"
    a: "Mostly yes. If you already use Gemini's OpenAI-compatible endpoint, change the base URL to https://api.augureai.ca/v1 and swap the key and model id. If you use the google-genai SDK, switch to the openai package; the chat call shape is similar. Reasoning, tools, streaming, images and PDFs are supported on Augure."
---

# Augure vs Gemini: Canadian handling versus Google scale

Gemini is Google's model family, sold three ways: inside Google Workspace, as a consumer app, and as the Gemini API. Augure is a Canadian AI platform for regulated organisations, with chat apps and an OpenAI-compatible API. The single biggest difference is jurisdiction and routing. Google LLC is a Delaware company; Augure is a Canadian company with no US parent or investors, and customer content is never handled by US-jurisdiction providers. Read this if you run a Canadian team on Workspace or build on the Gemini API and need to answer where the data goes.

## At a glance

| | Augure | Gemini (Google) |
|---|---|---|
| Company and jurisdiction | Canadian company, no US parent or investors. | Google LLC, organised under Delaware law, Mountain View, California, per its terms of service. |
| Where customer data is stored | Canada. | Workspace: EU or US data regions on eligible editions (Enterprise Plus, Assured Controls); otherwise Google's default locations. Gemini API: no region setting is documented. |
| Where inference runs | Canadian infrastructure (Ontario) and vetted EU partners under zero-data-retention; never US providers. | Workspace Gemini features follow the EU or US region policy since June 2025; the Gemini app since June 29, 2026. Vertex AI (Gemini Enterprise Agent Platform) lists Montréal as a region; the global endpoint may process anywhere. |
| Your data used for training | Never. | Workspace: not without customer permission. Gemini API: unpaid tier yes, paid tier no. Consumer app: yes when Keep Activity is on, with human review of a subset. |
| Canadian residency option | Storage always in Canada. Accounts can be set Canada-only: requests then stay in Canada or fail with `503 residency_unavailable`, never served elsewhere. tofino-3 and the Augure Open models never leave Canada. | Workspace data regions offer EU, US or both; no Canada option is listed. Vertex AI lists Canada (northamerica-northeast1) in its Gemini data-residency table; per-model support must be checked there. |
| API | OpenAI-compatible, https://api.augureai.ca/v1 | Native google-genai SDK, plus a beta OpenAI-compatible endpoint at https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1beta/openai/ |
| Models | ossington-5 (256K), rosedale-1 (up to 1M), tofino-3, Augure Open (GLM-5.3, Qwen3.8-Flash-Next) | Gemini 4 Argon (1M unified context), Gemini 3.1 Pro Preview, Gemini 3.8 Flash (1,048,576 input, 65,536 output), Flash-Lite tiers |
| Context and output caps | 256K input (rosedale-1 up to 1M); 32,768 output (tofino-3: 16,384) | Up to 1M input on Argon and 3.8 Flash; 65,536 output by default on Argon |
| Images and PDFs as input | Yes, images and PDFs on the API; images read on Augure-operated servers in Canada. | Yes, text, image, video, audio and PDF on 3.8 Flash and Argon. |
| Languages | English and Quebec French natively. | Multilingual; Google does not publish a Quebec French claim. |
| Billing currency | CAD. | Workspace plans in CAD on its Canadian pricing page; Gemini API in USD. |
| Certifications and security | SOC 2 and ISO 27001 in progress (readiness underway with Vanta, per https://augureai.ca/security). TLS 1.3 in transit, AES-256 at rest. | Workspace security page shows FedRAMP, HIPAA and ISO/IEC programmes; audit reports via Google Cloud compliance pages. |
| Best fit | Canadian organisations where data jurisdiction decides the purchase. | Teams already on Workspace, or developers who need Google's multimodal and 1M-context models at scale. |

## Where Gemini wins

- Workspace integration. Gemini is inside Gmail, Docs, Meet and Chat on Business Standard and up. Google's Canadian pricing page lists Standard at C$18.40 per user per month on monthly billing, with a promotional price shown for Nov 10, 2026 to Feb 10, 2027.
- Multimodal breadth. Gemini 3.8 Flash and Gemini 4 Argon accept text, image, video, audio and PDF in one request. Augure accepts text, images and PDFs.
- Context and output. Gemini 4 Argon has a unified 1M window with long decodes, and 3.8 Flash outputs up to 65,536 tokens. Augure's rosedale-1 reaches 1M input; output is capped at 32,768.
- Price at the low end. Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite lists at US$0.30 input and US$2.50 output per 1M tokens, and 3.8 Flash at US$0.75 and US$3.75 (rising Jan 1, 2027). A free tier exists for most models.
- Enterprise region controls, for EU and US. Enterprise Plus and Frontline Plus get in-region processing and storage, configurable per organisational unit.

## Where Augure wins

- Jurisdiction. Augure is a Canadian company with no US parent or investors. Customer conversations, documents and AI inference are never handled by US-jurisdiction providers, so the CLOUD Act's reach over US-controlled providers does not extend to customer content. Limited US processing exists for payment card networks and email delivery only, documented in the privacy policy.
- A Canadian residency option that fails closed. Canada-only accounts stay in Canada or return `503 residency_unavailable`. tofino-3 and Augure Open never leave Canada. Every API response names its `inference_region`.
- No training, on every tier. Customer data is never used to train models, including the Free plan. Gemini's free API tier and the consumer app with Keep Activity on do use content for training.
- Quebec French, natively. Chat and the models are built for Canadian law and Quebec regulatory context.
- CAD pricing you can budget. Free C$0, Pro C$20 per month, Max C$80 per month, Enterprise custom. API: ossington-5 C$1.50 input and C$3.00 output per 1M tokens; tofino-3 C$0.60 and C$2.00.

## Switch from Gemini to Augure

### Workspace or the Gemini app

1. Export. Consumer Gemini chats, generated media and uploads export from takeout.google.com under My Activity, limited to Gemini Apps; downloading does not delete them from Google's servers. Workspace Gemini prompts and responses are retained 90 days to indefinitely as set by admins; ask your admin for the export path.
2. Create an account or team at https://chat.augureai.ca.
3. What carries over: documents you re-upload, projects you recreate. What does not: chat history, Gems, Gemini Notebook content, and Workspace side-panel context. Augure Code & Cowork, the desktop app, connects to Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace, so files stay reachable.
4. SSO and Enterprise: enterprise@augureai.ca.
5. Run both for two weeks with a small group, then cut over.

### Gemini API

1. Create a key at https://augureai.ca/developers.
2. Change the base URL to `https://api.augureai.ca/v1` and the key to `aug_sk_live_...`.
3. Map models.

| Gemini model | Augure model | Why |
|---|---|---|
| gemini-4-argon, gemini-3.1-pro-preview | ossington-5 | Flagship reasoning, code, structured output; 256K context. Use rosedale-1 when you need up to 1M. |
| gemini-3.8-flash | ossington-5 with `reasoning_effort: "none"`, or tofino-3 | Fast answers; ossington-5 keeps reasoning available when you need it. |
| Gemini 3.5 Flash-Lite, Gemini 3.1 Flash-Lite | tofino-3 | Cheapest tier, thinking always off, served in Canada. |

4. Before and after in Python.

```python
# Before: Gemini, google-genai SDK
from google import genai
client = genai.Client(api_key=os.environ["GEMINI_API_KEY"])
response = client.models.generate_content(
    model="gemini-3.8-flash",
    contents="Summarise this contract in two lines.",
)
print(response.text)

# Before (alternative): Gemini's OpenAI-compatible endpoint
from openai import OpenAI
client = OpenAI(
    api_key=os.environ["GEMINI_API_KEY"],
    base_url="https://generativelanguage.googleapis.com/v1beta/openai/",
)

# After: Augure
from openai import OpenAI
client = OpenAI(base_url="https://api.augureai.ca/v1", api_key=os.environ["AUGURE_API_KEY"])
resp = client.chat.completions.create(
    model="ossington-5",
    messages=[{"role": "user", "content": "Summarise this contract in two lines."}],
)
print(resp.choices[0].message.content)
print(resp.model_extra["_augure"]["inference_region"])
```

Google's newer quickstart uses `client.interactions.create(model=..., input=...)` and `interaction.output_text`; the mapping to `messages` is the same.

5. Re-check: output caps are 32,768 tokens (tofino-3: 16,384), so split very long generations. Omit `max_tokens` on reasoning models. `reasoning_effort: "none"` turns thinking off on ossington-5; Gemini's compatibility layer cannot turn reasoning off on Gemini 3 models. `response_format` json_schema works, but on reasoning models it is prompt-enforced, so validate and retry once. Tools use the OpenAI schema; pin rosedale-1 for agent loops. Streaming errors arrive inside the stream. Audio and video inputs have no Augure equivalent.
6. Run both for a week, compare outputs and `usage`, then cut over.

## Keep Gemini if

- Your team lives in Workspace and the side panel is the product you want.
- You need audio or video input, or output over 65,000 tokens in one call.
- You are an EU or US organisation and Google's EU or US data regions satisfy your policy.
- You need Google's free API tier for prototypes and can accept its training terms.

## Sources

- https://policies.google.com/terms (checked 2026-10-27): Google LLC, Delaware, Mountain View.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/terms (checked 2026-10-27): effective March 23, 2026; unpaid vs paid data use, human review.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/pricing (checked 2026-10-27): USD prices, free tier, Jan 1, 2027 and Dec 1, 2026 price changes.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/models/gemini-3.8-flash (checked 2026-10-27): token limits, inputs, thinking levels.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/models/gemini-4-argon (checked 2026-10-27): 1M unified context, 65,536 default output.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/openai (checked 2026-10-27): OpenAI-compatible base URL, beta status, reasoning cannot be turned off on Gemini 3.
- https://github.com/googleapis/python-genai (checked 2026-10-27): generate_content example.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/quickstart (checked 2026-10-27): interactions.create quickstart.
- https://ai.google.dev/gemini-api/docs/available-regions (checked 2026-10-27): Canada available; no processing-region statement.
- https://workspaceupdates.googleblog.com/2025/06/data-regions-support-for-gemini-features-in-google-workspace.html (checked 2026-10-27): June 9, 2025; EU or US; Enterprise Plus and Assured Controls.
- https://workspaceupdates.googleblog.com/2026/06/gemini-app-data-regions-support.html (checked 2026-10-27): June 29, 2026; editions with processing vs storage only.
- https://knowledge.workspace.google.com/admin/gemini/generative-ai-in-google-workspace-privacy-hub (checked 2026-10-27): no training without permission, no human review, retention, Gemini Notebook exclusion.
- https://workspace.google.com/pricing (checked 2026-10-27): CAD per-user prices and promotional dates.
- https://workspace.google.com/security/ (checked 2026-10-27): FedRAMP, HIPAA, ISO/IEC programmes.
- https://support.google.com/gemini/answer/13594961 (checked 2026-10-27): Gemini Apps privacy notice, updated October 13, 2026; training, human review, retention.
- https://support.google.com/gemini/answer/16920332 (checked 2026-10-27): Takeout export of Gemini Apps data.
- https://docs.cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/generative-ai/docs/learn/locations (checked 2026-10-27): Montréal listed; endpoints and global endpoint caveats.
- https://docs.cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/generative-ai/docs/learn/data-residency (checked 2026-10-27): at-rest vs processing, Canada column, global endpoint has no residency guarantee.
- https://augureai.ca/llms.txt, https://augureai.ca/docs/api, https://augureai.ca/docs/models, https://augureai.ca/docs/agents, https://augureai.ca/docs/integrations/openai-python (checked 2026-10-27): all Augure facts and CAD prices.