{"slug": "apfel", "name": "apfel", "category": "ai", "category_name": "AI tools and apps", "description": "", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 10, "warners": 1, "score": 5.398, "rising": 2.02, "first": "2026-04-03", "latest": "2026-09-14", "why": "Cool tool but I don't get why these websites make idiotic claims", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 6, "neutral": 2, "compare": 1, "warn": 1}, "spark": [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 2, 1, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "Cool tool but I don't get why these websites make idiotic claims", "kind": "", "icon": false, "domain": null, "github_repo": "github.com/arthur-ficial/apfel", "official_url": "https://github.com/arthur-ficial/apfel", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["apfel", "Apfel"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 795160433, "item_id": 49697527, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49697527", "by": "Telemakhos", "date": "2026-09-14", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Apfel filled that role", "excerpt": "Apfel filled that role: $ apfel \"List the files in this folder.\" https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Command-line access to on-device AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple's Siri AI Can Be Swapped Out for Claude, ChatGPT, Code Shows"}, {"id": 790969888, "item_id": 49435618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49435618", "by": "lucky_cloud", "date": "2026-08-25", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Also see: https://apfel.franzai.com", "excerpt": "They already do: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundationmodels/systemlanguagemodel Also see: https://apfel.franzai.com", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "New Mac Studio with M5 Max and M5 Ultra"}, {"id": 788504208, "item_id": 49281513, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49281513", "by": "figmert", "date": "2026-08-12", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Apfel[0] has exposed it as a CLI:", "excerpt": "Appel has, and it can be used. Apfel[0] has exposed it as a CLI: $ apfel \"What is the capital of Austria?\" The capital of Austria is Vienna. [0] https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Apple on-device AI CLI", "switched_from": "", "story": "uBlock Origin Is Giving Up the Fight to Keep Ads Off Facebook"}, {"id": 775227601, "item_id": 48451725, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451725", "by": "kube-system", "date": "2026-06-08", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "If you've got a mac, you can use this to play around with it:", "excerpt": "> what's actually powering Apple Intelligence now. It's a 3B Apple Foundation model. https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/introducing-apple-foundation-models If you've got a mac, you can use this to play around with it: https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple reveals new AI architecture built around Google Gemini models"}, {"id": 766804464, "item_id": 47925279, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47925279", "by": "gibsonsmog", "date": "2026-04-27", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "you can install the apfel[1] stuff if you're on a mac and want a quick available onboard cli option", "excerpt": "Yeah, local is clearly the future. Even beyond the cheap Chinese models you can install the apfel[1] stuff if you're on a mac and want a quick available onboard cli option. And I'm sure people will adapt the Flash-MoE[2] integration to be even better soon as well. [1] https://apfel.franzai.com/ [2] https://github.com/danveloper/flash-moe", "context": "", "use_case": "On-device CLI", "switched_from": "", "story": "GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 762127248, "item_id": 47632953, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47632953", "by": "FinnKuhn", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "Ok, then it might just be pretty bad at German Sie/Du.", "excerpt": "Ok, then it might just be pretty bad at German Sie/Du. It manages to translate texts, but is unable to change between Du and Sie. interesting limitation I haven't encountered anywhere before. Even DeepL was able to swap between them. Here is the chat I used to test this again to highlight this limitation: you\u203a write a short email to john asking for a good time to meet ai\u203a Subject: Let's Catch Up Soon! Hi John, I hope", "context": "", "use_case": "on-device AI chat CLI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac"}]}], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["command-line access to on-device ai", "apple on-device ai cli", "on-device cli", "on-device ai chat cli", "on-device ai on mac", "apple ai on the command line"], "compared": [{"slug": "apple-foundation-models", "name": "Apple Foundation Models", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [{"id": 775251648, "item_id": 48453228, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48453228", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-06-08", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "i maintain https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel", "excerpt": "i am more excited about the ondevice foundation model update that is coming https://developer.apple.com/documentation/updates/foundationmodels (not much info yet) but i maintain https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel so i might be biased", "context": "maintainer", "use_case": "on-device Apple foundation model tool", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple Core AI Framework"}, {"id": 769414032, "item_id": 48088377, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48088377", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-05-10", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "i researched that question for apfel", "excerpt": "i researched that question for apfel https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel and standardized API is openai api so thats what i went with", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Local AI needs to be the norm"}, {"id": 762017616, "item_id": 47626101, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47626101", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "thx for the report - a totally valid attack vector i was not aware of before, should be fixed", "excerpt": "thx for the report - a totally valid attack vector i was not aware of before, should be fixed https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel/releases/tag/v0.6.23 - see also new https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel/blob/main/docs/server-security.md", "context": "", "use_case": "Local AI on Mac", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac"}, {"id": 761344960, "item_id": 47584060, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47584060", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-03-31", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "using it in bash scripts that just work without calling home", "excerpt": "I created \"apfel\" https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel a CLI for the apple on-device local foundation model (Apple intelligence) yeah its super limited with its 4k context window and super common false positives guardrails (just ask it to describe a color) ... bit still ... using it in bash scripts that just work without calling home / out or incurring extra costs feels super powerful.", "context": "", "use_case": "CLI for on-device Apple AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ollama is now powered by MLX on Apple Silicon in preview"}], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47624645", "title": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac", "mentions": 5}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49695409", "title": "Apple's Siri AI Can Be Swapped Out for Claude, ChatGPT, Code Shows", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49433316", "title": "New Mac Studio with M5 Max and M5 Ultra", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49270726", "title": "uBlock Origin Is Giving Up the Fight to Keep Ads Off Facebook", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48894752", "title": "Apple's new SpeechAnalyzer API, benchmarked against Whisper and its predecessor", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48449665", "title": "Apple Core AI Framework", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"recommend": 2, "compare": 1, "neutral": 1, "warn": 1}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-08": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-09": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-10": {}}, "versions": [], "version_unnamed": 0, "family_ref": null, "runs_on": null, "lines": [], "quotes": [{"id": 795160433, "item_id": 49697527, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49697527", "by": "Telemakhos", "date": "2026-09-14", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Apfel filled that role", "excerpt": "Apfel filled that role: $ apfel \"List the files in this folder.\" https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Command-line access to on-device AI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple's Siri AI Can Be Swapped Out for Claude, ChatGPT, Code Shows"}, {"id": 790969888, "item_id": 49435618, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49435618", "by": "lucky_cloud", "date": "2026-08-25", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Also see: https://apfel.franzai.com", "excerpt": "They already do: https://developer.apple.com/documentation/foundationmodels/systemlanguagemodel Also see: https://apfel.franzai.com", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "New Mac Studio with M5 Max and M5 Ultra"}, {"id": 788504208, "item_id": 49281513, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49281513", "by": "figmert", "date": "2026-08-12", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Apfel[0] has exposed it as a CLI:", "excerpt": "Appel has, and it can be used. Apfel[0] has exposed it as a CLI: $ apfel \"What is the capital of Austria?\" The capital of Austria is Vienna. [0] https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "Apple on-device AI CLI", "switched_from": "", "story": "uBlock Origin Is Giving Up the Fight to Keep Ads Off Facebook"}, {"id": 782328256, "item_id": 48895516, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48895516", "by": "satvikpendem", "date": "2026-07-13", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Apfel is a wrapper app like ChatGPT but using Apple Foundation Models", "excerpt": "It's a local model so it's essentially open weight such that you could feasibly export it somehow since it's already on the laptop somewhere. Apfel is a wrapper app like ChatGPT but using Apple Foundation Models, I assume something similar will happen with this transcription model. https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple's new SpeechAnalyzer API, benchmarked against Whisper and its predecessor"}, {"id": 775227601, "item_id": 48451725, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48451725", "by": "kube-system", "date": "2026-06-08", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "If you've got a mac, you can use this to play around with it:", "excerpt": "> what's actually powering Apple Intelligence now. It's a 3B Apple Foundation model. https://machinelearning.apple.com/research/introducing-apple-foundation-models If you've got a mac, you can use this to play around with it: https://apfel.franzai.com/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Apple reveals new AI architecture built around Google Gemini models"}, {"id": 766804464, "item_id": 47925279, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47925279", "by": "gibsonsmog", "date": "2026-04-27", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "you can install the apfel[1] stuff if you're on a mac and want a quick available onboard cli option", "excerpt": "Yeah, local is clearly the future. Even beyond the cheap Chinese models you can install the apfel[1] stuff if you're on a mac and want a quick available onboard cli option. And I'm sure people will adapt the Flash-MoE[2] integration to be even better soon as well. [1] https://apfel.franzai.com/ [2] https://github.com/danveloper/flash-moe", "context": "", "use_case": "On-device CLI", "switched_from": "", "story": "GitHub Copilot is moving to usage-based billing"}, {"id": 764781920, "item_id": 47798870, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47798870", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-04-16", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "apfel is v1.0.4 stable today", "excerpt": "as every AI provider is pushing news today, just wanted to say that apfel is v1.0.4 stable today https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Claude Opus 4.7"}, {"id": 762127248, "item_id": 47632953, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47632953", "by": "FinnKuhn", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "warn", "quote": "Ok, then it might just be pretty bad at German Sie/Du.", "excerpt": "Ok, then it might just be pretty bad at German Sie/Du. It manages to translate texts, but is unable to change between Du and Sie. interesting limitation I haven't encountered anywhere before. Even DeepL was able to swap between them. Here is the chat I used to test this again to highlight this limitation: you\u203a write a short email to john asking for a good time to meet ai\u203a Subject: Let's Catch Up Soon! Hi John, I hope", "context": "", "use_case": "on-device AI chat CLI", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac"}, {"id": 762048384, "item_id": 47628024, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47628024", "by": "gurjeet", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Submitted a PR to prevent its installation on macos versions older than Tahoe(26)", "excerpt": "Thank you for making it open source! Submitted a PR to prevent its installation on macos versions older than Tahoe(26), since I was able to install it on my older macos 15, but it aborted on execution. https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/homebrew-tap/pull/1", "context": "", "use_case": "On-device AI on Mac", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac"}, {"id": 762028656, "item_id": 47626791, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47626791", "by": "EddieLomax", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "compare", "quote": "This is similar to something I was playing around with last month", "excerpt": "This is similar to something I was playing around with last month-- basically just a CLI for accessing the foundational models. https://github.com/ehamiter/afm It's really handy for quick things like \"what's the capital of country x\" but for coding, I feel that it is severely limited. With such a small context it's (currently) not great for complicated things.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac"}, {"id": 762008128, "item_id": 47625508, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47625508", "by": "ramon156", "date": "2026-04-03", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Cool tool but I don't get why these websites make idiotic claims", "excerpt": "Cool tool but I don't get why these websites make idiotic claims > $0 cost No kidding. Why not just link the GH Github: https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel \u2013 The free AI already on your Mac"}, {"id": 760280960, "item_id": 47517560, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47517560", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-03-25", "version": null, "stance": "recommend", "quote": "if you are into local LLMs check out apfel", "excerpt": "if you are into local LLMs check out apfel https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel Apple Ai on the command line", "context": "", "use_case": "Apple AI on the command line", "switched_from": "", "story": "Local LLM by Ente"}, {"id": 760125840, "item_id": 47507865, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47507865", "by": "franze", "date": "2026-03-24", "version": null, "stance": "neutral", "quote": "50+ sample results from apple ai https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel/blob/main/EXAMPLES.md", "excerpt": "50+ sample results from apple ai https://github.com/Arthur-Ficial/apfel/blob/main/EXAMPLES.md", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: Apfel - Apple Intelligence from the Command Line"}]}