LM Studio

LM Studio is a free desktop app for finding, downloading and chatting with open models on your own machine. There is no terminal and no setup ceremony: pick a model, download it and start asking.

A reasonably modern computer. Smaller models run on ordinary laptops, and more memory or a GPU lets you run larger ones. The point is testing on hardware you already own.

Yes, including for use at work. The costs are your time and, later, the infrastructure for anything you promote to production.

Models are downloaded once, then chat and testing run locally. That makes it safe to trial with realistic material, applying the same care you would to any sensitive document handling.

Both, in order. LM Studio is the friendly desktop on-ramp for evaluating; Ollama is the server workhorse for production. Prove it in one, deploy it on the other.

It is the quickest way to see what an open model can actually do before anyone buys hardware. It is not a server. For shared use and for applications, that is where Ollama comes in.

It comes down to memory more than anything else. Smaller models run comfortably on an ordinary work laptop, larger ones need a well specified machine. We test on your actual hardware rather than guessing.

That is exactly how we use it. Run your real questions through a few open models on a laptop first. If the answers are good enough there, the case for a proper deployment writes itself.