Beginners

Where to Start

New to local AI? The best beginner resources for understanding what local AI is, picking a model, and getting your first chat running on your own machine.

Published May 31st, 2026 · Updated Jul 12th, 2026

All focus areas
Quickstart Pick

Ollama

cli easy

The easiest way to get a local model running. Pull a model with one command and chat with it straight from the terminal or over a local API.

Website Docs
Quickstart Pick

Jan

gui easy

An open source, privacy-first desktop app for running local models, built as a ChatGPT alternative that works fully offline.

Website Docs

LM Studio

gui easy

A polished desktop app for discovering, downloading, and chatting with local models. No command line required.

Website Docs

GPT4All

gui easy

A free desktop app from Nomic AI for running local models, with a built-in LocalDocs feature for chatting with your own files completely offline.

Website Docs

Open WebUI

gui medium feature-rich

A self-hosted, feature-rich web interface for chatting with local models, built to run on top of Ollama or any OpenAI-compatible API.

Website Docs

AnythingLLM

gui easy feature-rich

An all-in-one desktop app for chatting with local models and your own documents, with built-in RAG, multi-user workspaces, and support for AI agents.

Website Docs
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