{"slug": "jan", "name": "Jan", "category": "ai", "category_name": "AI models and assistants", "description": "", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 11, "warners": 0, "score": 6.353, "rising": -1.96, "first": "2025-11-03", "latest": "2026-10-02", "why": "Give Jan (https://www.jan.ai/) a try for instance.", "why_is_quote": true, "has_verdict": false, "sentiment": {"recommend": 6, "neutral": 2, "compare": 3, "warn": 0}, "spark": [1, 0, 1, 0, 0, 2, 0, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0], "listed": true, "loved": [], "caveat": "", "short_quote": "Give Jan (https://www.jan.ai/) a try for instance.", "kind": "", "icon": true, "domain": "jan.ai", "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://jan.ai", "pricing": "", "aliases": ["Jan"], "verdict": null, "praise": [{"label": "", "summary": "", "quotes": [{"id": 783832256, "item_id": 48989516, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48989516", "by": "a3w", "date": "2026-07-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "jan.ai is the F/LOSS alternative to it.", "excerpt": "jan.ai is the F/LOSS alternative to it. If you do want a gui.", "context": "", "use_case": "local LLM desktop app", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nativ: Run frontier open models locally on your Mac"}, {"id": 773660768, "item_id": 48353798, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48353798", "by": "AnthonyR", "date": "2026-06-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "is similar and works great for me", "excerpt": "Maybe I am misunderstanding but I feel like https://www.jan.ai/ is similar and works great for me", "context": "", "use_case": "Local AI chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Odysseus \u2013 self-hosted AI workspace"}, {"id": 767435505, "item_id": 47964719, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47964719", "by": "rglullis", "date": "2026-04-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Open WebUI or Jan (https://www.jan.ai/)", "excerpt": "Open WebUI or Jan (https://www.jan.ai/). Work well with Ollama.", "context": "", "use_case": "Chat UI for local models", "switched_from": "", "story": "Granite 4.1: IBM's 8B Model Matching 32B MoE"}, {"id": 764635393, "item_id": 47789712, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47789712", "by": "mentalgear", "date": "2026-04-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Jan(https://www.jan.ai/) is another open-source desktop app with a clean chat interface", "excerpt": "The reported alternatives seem pretty User-Friendly to me: > LM Studio gives you a GUI if that\u2019s what you want. It uses llama.cpp under the hood, exposes all the knobs, and supports any GGUF model without lock-in. > Jan(https://www.jan.ai/) is another open-source desktop app with a clean chat interface and local-first design. > Msty(https://msty.ai/) offers a polished GUI with multi-model support and built-in RAG. ko", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Using Ollama"}, {"id": 748824976, "item_id": 46801561, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46801561", "by": "jckahn", "date": "2026-01-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Jan: https://www.jan.ai/", "excerpt": "Jan: https://www.jan.ai/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LM Studio 0.4.0"}]}], "caveats": [], "who": [], "tags": [], "use_cases": ["running local models", "gui ai client", "local llm desktop app", "local ai chat", "chat ui for local models", "local llm chat"], "compared": [{"slug": "lm-studio", "name": "LM Studio", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "opencode", "name": "OpenCode", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ollama", "name": "Ollama", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48982681", "title": "Nativ: Run frontier open models locally on your Mac", "mentions": 3}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49926069", "title": "Pi 1.0", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48497111", "title": "Ask HN: What models can you use with OpenCode that offer some level of privacy", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48346693", "title": "Odysseus \u2013 self-hosted AI workspace", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47960507", "title": "Granite 4.1: IBM's 8B Model Matching 32B MoE", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47788385", "title": "Stop Using Ollama", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"neutral": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"recommend": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {}, "2026-04": {"recommend": 2}, "2026-05": {}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 1, "compare": 1}, "2026-07": {"neutral": 1, "compare": 1, "recommend": 1}, "2026-08": {}, "2026-09": {}, "2026-10": {"compare": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 798941524, "item_id": 49933845, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49933845", "by": "james2doyle", "date": "2026-10-02", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I do think you could take a look at ChatWise, Kelivo, Rikkahub, Jan, and Waku if you wanted to see who your real competitors are.", "excerpt": "Been a happy Juggler since I first saw it on here. I really think it is much more approachable for people who are intimidated/overwhelmed by the terminal and just want an all in one solution that is intuitive, pre-configured, and also works great. I really like the \"auto approve\" strategy given lots of people have no idea when something like a `sed` is going to write or read. However, I likely wouldnt suggest Pi (or ", "context": "", "use_case": "GUI AI client", "switched_from": "", "story": "Pi 1.0"}, {"id": 783832256, "item_id": 48989516, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48989516", "by": "a3w", "date": "2026-07-21", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "jan.ai is the F/LOSS alternative to it.", "excerpt": "jan.ai is the F/LOSS alternative to it. If you do want a gui.", "context": "", "use_case": "local LLM desktop app", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nativ: Run frontier open models locally on your Mac"}, {"id": 783823970, "item_id": 48988998, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48988998", "by": "jsomedon", "date": "2026-07-21", "stance": "compare", "quote": "I can't really tell why would I use this over like lm studio, jan.ai and such?", "excerpt": "I can't really tell why would I use this over like lm studio, jan.ai and such?", "context": "", "use_case": "running local models", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nativ: Run frontier open models locally on your Mac"}, {"id": 783740721, "item_id": 48983795, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48983795", "by": "philips", "date": "2026-07-20", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "which is what https://jan.ai uses", "excerpt": "There is also https://github.com/ml-explore/mlx-swift-lm which is what https://jan.ai uses.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Nativ: Run frontier open models locally on your Mac"}, {"id": 775962163, "item_id": 48497635, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48497635", "by": "jonahbenton", "date": "2026-06-11", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Jan and LMStudio are other options for actually running a model on your own hardware", "excerpt": "OpenCode is a \"harness\" that manages conversations/interactions with LLMs. It does not run a model itself. An extended interaction can include- many turns of conversation, providing files for the LLM to process, having the LLM direct the running of programs called tools by the harness. The privacy aspect is determined by which LLM you configure OpenCode to use. If you configure it to use an LLM you host yourself, the", "context": "", "use_case": "running local models", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: What models can you use with OpenCode that offer some level of privacy"}, {"id": 773660768, "item_id": 48353798, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48353798", "by": "AnthonyR", "date": "2026-06-01", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "is similar and works great for me", "excerpt": "Maybe I am misunderstanding but I feel like https://www.jan.ai/ is similar and works great for me", "context": "", "use_case": "Local AI chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "Odysseus \u2013 self-hosted AI workspace"}, {"id": 767435505, "item_id": 47964719, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47964719", "by": "rglullis", "date": "2026-04-30", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Open WebUI or Jan (https://www.jan.ai/)", "excerpt": "Open WebUI or Jan (https://www.jan.ai/). Work well with Ollama.", "context": "", "use_case": "Chat UI for local models", "switched_from": "", "story": "Granite 4.1: IBM's 8B Model Matching 32B MoE"}, {"id": 764635393, "item_id": 47789712, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47789712", "by": "mentalgear", "date": "2026-04-16", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Jan(https://www.jan.ai/) is another open-source desktop app with a clean chat interface", "excerpt": "The reported alternatives seem pretty User-Friendly to me: > LM Studio gives you a GUI if that\u2019s what you want. It uses llama.cpp under the hood, exposes all the knobs, and supports any GGUF model without lock-in. > Jan(https://www.jan.ai/) is another open-source desktop app with a clean chat interface and local-first design. > Msty(https://msty.ai/) offers a polished GUI with multi-model support and built-in RAG. ko", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Stop Using Ollama"}, {"id": 748824976, "item_id": 46801561, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46801561", "by": "jckahn", "date": "2026-01-28", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Jan: https://www.jan.ai/", "excerpt": "Jan: https://www.jan.ai/", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "LM Studio 0.4.0"}, {"id": 737389696, "item_id": 46086856, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46086856", "by": "yakkomajuri", "date": "2025-11-29", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Give Jan (https://www.jan.ai/) a try for instance.", "excerpt": "In this case do you even need a RAG? Most models will have been trained on Wikipedia anyway. Give Jan (https://www.jan.ai/) a try for instance. You'll need to do a bit of research as to what model will give you the best perf on your system but one of the quantized Llama or Qwen models will probably suit you well.", "context": "", "use_case": "Local LLM chat", "switched_from": "", "story": "So you wanna build a local RAG?"}, {"id": 732802064, "item_id": 45800129, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45800129", "by": "bdhtu", "date": "2025-11-03", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "https://github.com/janhq/jan", "excerpt": "GitHub links: - https://github.com/janhq/jan - https://github.com/danny-avila/LibreChat - https://github.com/Mintplex-Labs/anything-llm", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "OSS Alternative to Open WebUI \u2013 ChatGPT-Like UI, API and CLI"}]}