I'm wondering, is there a tool or something out there that helps me pick a model, in the vast sea of models out there these days? Every time I need a model for something I see the list on openrouter and I'm completely overwhelmed.
I'd love to be able to explain my use case, my cost preferences and have a tool select a few good models to try.
E.g. I wrote a tool that cleans out my email spam box. It classifies emails that are already flagged as spam, and if it's very obviously spam it removes it permanently (keeps a copy on disk though). And after x emails, it goes through the list of deleted spam mails and suggests email rules. What model would be best suited? I'd love to be able to explain this use case and get this info served to me. The list of models and the information about what they're good at is just too splintered and spread out. I landed on google/gemma-4-31b for now, because it's cheap and good enough and also supports Dutch and French a bit. But I can't realistically try them all.
My approach to this problem is to just...not try them all.
As long as the model you're using solves the problems you have to your satisfaction, there is no need to try any other models, except for financial reasons maybe.
So I start with a relatively cheap model (GLM 5.3 flash for me) and as long as it accomplishes the task (it did so far) I don't have to change. And even if it can't do something, the first thing I change is see if I can give it more tools or better context (useful even if I switch models later) or trying a different approach to the problem.
If google/gemma-4-31b works, you don't need to overthink it.
> If google/gemma-4-31b works, you don't need to overthink it.
Up until recently I had a gemini flash 2.0 api deployed that did summarization and translation of news articles/corporate statements fast and cheap and had no reason to update it.
If it works fine, this chase of the latest LLM is bit pointless.
Yeah, I really think we are on the cusp on the difference between SOTA and cheap models is small enough that paying 10x or 100x the cost makes no sense.
It also helps that a lot of effort has already been spent figuring out how to do more with weaker models because SOTA 1 year ago was behind what the cheap models do today.
1 year from now, unless the SOTA companies come up with something truly revolutionary they will be in a lot of trouble.
mavamaarten · · focus · HN ↗
I'd love to be able to explain my use case, my cost preferences and have a tool select a few good models to try.
E.g. I wrote a tool that cleans out my email spam box. It classifies emails that are already flagged as spam, and if it's very obviously spam it removes it permanently (keeps a copy on disk though). And after x emails, it goes through the list of deleted spam mails and suggests email rules. What model would be best suited? I'd love to be able to explain this use case and get this info served to me. The list of models and the information about what they're good at is just too splintered and spread out. I landed on google/gemma-4-31b for now, because it's cheap and good enough and also supports Dutch and French a bit. But I can't realistically try them all.
Systemerror7A69 · · focus · HN ↗
As long as the model you're using solves the problems you have to your satisfaction, there is no need to try any other models, except for financial reasons maybe.
So I start with a relatively cheap model (GLM 5.3 flash for me) and as long as it accomplishes the task (it did so far) I don't have to change. And even if it can't do something, the first thing I change is see if I can give it more tools or better context (useful even if I switch models later) or trying a different approach to the problem.
If google/gemma-4-31b works, you don't need to overthink it.
epolanski · · focus · HN ↗
Up until recently I had a gemini flash 2.0 api deployed that did summarization and translation of news articles/corporate statements fast and cheap and had no reason to update it.
If it works fine, this chase of the latest LLM is bit pointless.
Lalabadie · · focus · HN ↗
(I think you're right)
cogman10 · · focus · HN ↗
It also helps that a lot of effort has already been spent figuring out how to do more with weaker models because SOTA 1 year ago was behind what the cheap models do today.
1 year from now, unless the SOTA companies come up with something truly revolutionary they will be in a lot of trouble.