I use all six of these models every week. Here's my honest take on which one to reach for, and when.
🕐 Updated June 2026 · 6 sectionsI keep all six of these models open in tabs most days. They're not interchangeable — each has personality quirks and strengths that make it shine for certain tasks and stumble on others. I've tested them across coding, writing, research, and creative work. No hype, no benchmark theater — just what I've actually experienced.
Free tier, multimodal, 128K context, browser access. This is my default — it handles 80% of what I throw at it competently. The voice mode is genuinely fun for brainstorming. Speed has improved dramatically in 2026.
200K context and noticeably fewer hallucinations. When I need to dump a 50-page document and ask detailed questions, this is where I go. Claude Code (their coding agent) is the secret weapon for large refactors.
That 1M token context window is not a gimmick — I fed it an entire book and it found references I'd forgotten about. Google Search integration means factual answers come with sources. Indispensable for research-heavy work.
671B parameters, near GPT-4 quality, and you can run it yourself. The free API is genuinely fast. If you're building something that needs a capable model without per-token costs, this is the obvious answer.
X/Twitter integration and an unfiltered personality set it apart. It's the only model that feels like it has opinions. Great for current events and conversations where you don't want the sanitized corporate voice.
Runs on consumer GPUs, fully open, and the multimodal capabilities are solid. If you care about privacy or want to fine-tune on your own data, nothing else gives you this level of control. Not the strongest raw performer, but the most flexible.
Claude 4 Sonnet and GPT-4o. Claude better at complex codebases; GPT-4o faster for quick snippets.
Yes. DeepSeek V3 offers free API. Google Gemini has generous free tier. Llama 4 is completely free to run locally.
Gemini 2.5 Pro: 1 million tokens (~750K words). Claude 4: 200K tokens.
Most allow on paid tiers. Open-source models (DeepSeek, Llama) have no restrictions.
Major updates every 3-6 months. Minor improvements roll out continuously.