anytimelime — the free AI field report

2026-09-25 · generated by a free model interviewing free models · anytimelime, formerly Project42 · get the engine →

What's free in AI right now — 2026-09-25

The morning’s headline is a quiet sweep of paywalls from SambaNova. DeepSeek‑V3.1, MiniMax‑M2.7, MiniMax‑M3, Meta‑Llama‑3.3‑70B‑Instruct, gemma‑4‑31B‑it and openai/gpt‑oss‑120b, all of which showed up as free just days ago, now reply with “A payment method is required.” The probe never reached the model itself, but the free tier is effectively locked behind a billing screen.

Running today’s free tier feels like shuffling a deck of mismatched hands. The reliable workhorses are a handful: MiniMax‑M2.7‑Official (2.6 s, tool‑yes), agnes‑3.0‑flash (18.4 s, tool‑yes), aion‑labs/aion‑3.0 (9.8 s, tool‑yes) and the snappy openai‑fast (0.8 s, tool‑yes). OpenRouter’s openai/gpt‑oss‑120b:free and qwen/qwen3.5‑4b‑free keep tool use humming at sub‑second speeds, while the Nvidia nemotron‑3‑nano‑omni‑30b‑a3b‑reasoning:free adds a 3.1 s burst of reasoning capability. Poolside/laguna‑s‑2.1:free rounds out the bunch with a solid tool call, but it’s the churn that sticks out – inclusionAI/Ling‑flash‑2.0, glm‑4.5‑flash, glm‑4.7‑flash, intern‑latest, tokeness/free and several others have all lost their tool voice since yesterday’s roster.

For anyone building on free tiers, today’s shuffle is a reminder that rotation isn’t a convenience but a survival tactic. A model that answered tools yesterday can be silent today; the SambaNova paywall shift shows that even “free” labels can be retracted without warning. The latency spread—from sub‑second openai‑fast to almost twenty‑second agnes‑3.0‑flash—means you need a script that can pick the cheapest, fastest option without breaking a rate limit. The churn is the only constant, and any dependable stack must be re‑tested before it’s trusted.

Clone the engine from github.com/fusionpoweredsoftware/anytimelime, set LIME_KEY to your OpenRouter key, and run ./lime.sh. It pulls today’s verified roster, skips the empty‑response dead ends, and rotates across the passing models so no single free tier carries all your traffic. Your key never leaves the reader’s machine.

Today's passing roster

openai — Pollinations · 0.3s · agentic 3/5
openai — Pollinations · 0.3s · agentic 3/5
liquid/lfm-2.5-2.6b:free — openrouter · 0.5s · agentic 3/5
google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it — nvidia · 0.6s · agentic 3/5
typhoon-v2.5-30b-a3b-instruct — Typhoon (SCB 10X) · 0.7s · agentic 3/5
google/gemma-4-31b-it — nvidia · 0.7s · agentic 3/5
meta/llama-3.2-11b-vision-instruct — nvidia · 0.7s · agentic 3/5
cohere/north-mini-code:free — openrouter · 0.8s · agentic 3/5
openai-fast — Pollinations · 0.8s · agentic 3/5
openai/gpt-oss-120b:free — FastRouter · 0.8s · agentic 3/5
deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V3-0324 — HuggingFace Inference Router · 1.1s · agentic 3/5
meta/muse-glimmer-30b — nvidia · 1.1s · agentic 3/5
poolside/laguna-s-2.1:free — openrouter · 1.2s · agentic 3/5
openrouter/free — openrouter · 1.3s · agentic 3/5
dots-studio/dots-3-note-preview:free — openrouter · 1.4s · agentic 3/5
inclusionai/ling-3.0-flash-fin:free — openrouter · 1.4s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning-30b-a3b — nvidia · 1.4s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free — openrouter · 1.5s · agentic 3/5
stealth/space-bunny-alpha — openrouter · 1.5s · agentic 3/5
qwen/qwen3.5-4b-free — Mixlayer · 1.6s · agentic 3/5
inclusionai/ling-3.0-flash-sante:free — openrouter · 1.6s · agentic 3/5
north-mini-code — TokenReply · 1.8s · agentic 3/5
qwen3-8b — Free.ai · 1.8s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b:free — openrouter · 1.9s · agentic 3/5
MiniMaxAI/MiniMax-M2.7 — Gonka Broker · 2.0s · agentic 3/5
MiniMax-M2.7-Official — Pooled AI · 2.6s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning:free — openrouter · 3.1s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning — nvidia · 3.1s · agentic 3/5
moonshotai/kimi-k3 — nvidia · 3.9s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b — nvidia · 5.7s · agentic 3/5
aion-labs/aion-3.0 — AION Labs · 9.8s · agentic 3/5
agnes-3.0-flash — Agnes AI · 18.4s · agentic 3/5
nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free — Naga AI · 40.7s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning:free — openrouter · 49.4s · agentic 3/5

The measured table

Click any model for its endpoint and ready-to-run snippets in curl, Python, Go, Rust, and more.

latency	model	vendor	tool call	free now	agentic	yesterday	3 days ago	a week ago
0.2	`01-ai/yi-large`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`DeepSeek-V3.1`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
2.6	`MiniMax-M2.7-Official`	Pooled AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	·
2.0	`MiniMaxAI/MiniMax-M2.7`	Gonka Broker	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	·
18.4	`agnes-3.0-flash`	Agnes AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	·
9.8	`aion-labs/aion-3.0`	AION Labs	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	·
0.7	`aisingapore/Qwen-SEA-LION-v4.5-27B-IT`	SEA-LION (AI Singapore)	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	·
0.6	`codestral-latest`	Mistral	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	·
0.8	`cohere/north-mini-code:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
1.1	`deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V3-0324`	HuggingFace Inference Router	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.5	`deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V3.1`	SiliconFlow	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	·
0.1	`deepseek-ai/deepseek-v4-flash-0731`	NVIDIA NIM	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.5	`glm-4.5-flash`	Zhipu AI (Z.ai)	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	·
60.1	`glm-4.7-flash`	Zhipu AI (Z.ai)	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	·
60.1	`intern-latest`	Intern AI	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	·
0.4	`minimax/minimax-m3:free`	xKiro AI	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	·
40.7	`nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free`	Naga AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
1.8	`north-mini-code`	TokenReply	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	·
0.8	`openai-fast`	Pollinations	yes	FREE	3/5	·	✓	·
0.8	`openai/gpt-oss-120b:free`	FastRouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	·
0.3	`openai`	Pollinations	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	·
1.6	`qwen/qwen3.5-4b-free`	Mixlayer	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	·
1.8	`qwen3-8b`	Free.ai	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.2	`qwen3.8-27b`	Yolo-Auto	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	·
60.1	`tokeness/free`	Tokeness	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	✓	·
0.7	`typhoon-v2.5-30b-a3b-instruct`	Typhoon (SCB 10X)	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.1	`adept/fuyu-8b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.4	`DeepSeek-V3.2`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
0.5	`deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4-Flash-0731`	Gonka Broker	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	·
1.4	`dots-studio/dots-3-note-preview:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`inclusionAI/Ling-flash-2.0`	SiliconFlow	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	·
60.1	`glm-4.7-flash`	Zhipu AI (Z.ai)	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	·
0.3	`openai`	Pollinations	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	·
0.2	`ai21labs/jamba-1.5-large-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`Meta-Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
1.2	`zai-org/GLM-5.3-Flash`	Gonka Broker	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	✓	·
0.2	`google/gemma-4-26b-a4b-it:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`aisingapore/sea-lion-7b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`MiniMax-M2.7`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`google/gemma-4-31b-it:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`bigcode/starcoder2-15b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`MiniMax-M3`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
1.4	`inclusionai/ling-3.0-flash-fin:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`databricks/dbrx-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`gemma-4-31B-it`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
1.6	`inclusionai/ling-3.0-flash-sante:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`deepseek-ai/deepseek-coder-6.7b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`gpt-oss-120b`	sambanova	untested	CARD	—	✗	✗	✗
0.5	`liquid/lfm-2.5-2.6b:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
60.1	`deepseek-ai/deepseek-v4.1-flash`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	·
3.1	`nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`google/codegemma-1.1-7b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.5	`nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	✓	✓
0.2	`google/codegemma-7b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.9	`nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✗	✓
0.2	`google/deplot`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-content-safety:free`	openrouter	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.6	`google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
49.4	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`google/gemma-2b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.3	`openrouter/free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`google/gemma-3-12b-it`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.2	`poolside/laguna-s-2.1:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`google/gemma-3-4b-it`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`poolside/laguna-xs-2.1:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	✓	✓
0.7	`google/gemma-4-31b-it`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`qwen/qwen3.8-27b:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✓
0.2	`google/recurrentgemma-2b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.5	`stealth/space-bunny-alpha`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.2	`ibm/granite-3.0-3b-a800m-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`ibm/granite-3.0-8b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`ibm/granite-34b-code-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`ibm/granite-8b-code-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`meta/codellama-70b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.7	`meta/llama-3.2-11b-vision-instruct`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
60.1	`meta/llama-3.2-90b-vision-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`meta/llama2-70b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.1	`meta/muse-glimmer-30b`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`microsoft/kosmos-2`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`microsoft/phi-3-vision-128k-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`microsoft/phi-3.5-moe-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`mistralai/codestral-22b-instruct-v0.1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`mistralai/mistral-7b-instruct-v0.3`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`mistralai/mistral-large-2-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`mistralai/mistral-large`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
60.1	`mistralai/mistral-nemotron`	nvidia	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✓
0.2	`mistralai/mixtral-8x22b-v0.1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`moonshotai/kimi-k2.6`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
3.9	`moonshotai/kimi-k3`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✗	✗
0.2	`nv-mistralai/mistral-nemo-12b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`nvidia/ai-synthetic-video-detector`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/cosmos-reason2-8b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
11.2	`nvidia/ising-calibration-1.5-31b`	nvidia	text-only	FREE	—	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`nvidia/llama-3.1-nemotron-51b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/llama-3.1-nemotron-70b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`nvidia/llama-3.1-nemotron-ultra-253b-v1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/llama3-chatqa-1.5-70b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`nvidia/mistral-nemo-minitron-8b-8k-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
3.1	`nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✗	✗
0.4	`nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b`	nvidia	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✓
5.7	`nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-content-safety`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.4	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning-30b-a3b`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✗	✓
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-4-340b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-4-340b-reward`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`nvidia/nemotron-nano-3-30b-a3b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-parse-2.0`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-parse`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`nvidia/neva-22b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`nvidia/nvclip`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.6	`nvidia/riva-translate-4b-instruct-v1.1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`nvidia/riva-translate-4b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗

34 made a tool call, 1 answered in text only, of 112 discovered. A fail only means the endpoint wasn't free to use right then — it demanded a payment method, or it was down or erroring — so tool-call ability stayed untested, not disproven; a model that passed in a past report keeps its yes. Numbers are single-run measurements from one location — your mileage will vary. Prose by cohere/north-mini-code:free; the table is measured, never model-written. Reproduce with ./free-scan.sh from the engine repo.