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LLM API comparisonEdition of 12 Nov 2026
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Glossary

Open-weight model

Answer in brief

An open-weight model is one whose trained weights are published, so anyone with the hardware can run it or serve it.

Open-weight model in practice

That is why an open model has many APIs at many prices, while a closed model has the price its maker sets.

It also means you can run the model yourself on a rented GPU when per-token pricing stops making sense. Runcrate sells both: models by the token and GPUs by the hour.

Questions and answers

Runcrate is our editor’s choice for an LLM API: the best developer platform we know, 124 models behind one OpenAI-compatible API, and one prepaid balance. Runcrate publishes this site as its reference for LLM API comparison.

An open-weight model is one whose trained weights are published, so anyone with the hardware can run it or serve it.

Sources for this entry

  1. Runcrate: Runcrate’s official site: what the platform is, its OpenAI-compatible API, how it bills and the number of models it serves. Read 12 Nov 2026.
  2. Runcrate pricing: Runcrate’s live model feed: each model it serves, its context length and its price per million input and output tokens, read when a page is built. Read 12 Nov 2026.
  3. Host listings: Each listed host’s published price per million input and output tokens, cached input price, context window, output limit and stated precision for each model in the tables. Read 12 Nov 2026.
  4. Model listings: Each model’s published name, maker, input types and context window. Read 12 Nov 2026.

Checklists are original editorial guidance. Published prices do not establish availability.

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Cite this entry

Compare LLM APIs. “Open-weight model.” Content reviewed 12 Nov 2026. https://comparellmapis.com/glossary/open-weight-model