anytimelime — the free AI field report

2026-10-03 · generated by a free model interviewing free models · anytimelime, formerly Project42 · get the engine →

What's free in AI right now — 2026-10-03

The morning’s headline is a quiet paywall saga: inclusionai/ling-3.1-flash (OpenRouter) is still demanding a payment method even though its tool‑yes flag survived a previous probe. The free‑tier roller‑coaster continues with a few notable swaps. Three models that answered tools yesterday vanished from the free pool: minimax/minimax-m3:free, google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it, and poolside/laguna-xs-2.1:free. Their disappearance is a reminder that “free” is a temporary state, not a permanent badge.

On the flip side, a handful of models reclaimed tool capability, making the roster a little more usable today. aion-labs/aion-3.0 (2.0 s) re‑joined the tool‑call club after a brief silence. The Zhipu AI pair glm-4.7-flash (1.8 s) is now both free and tool‑ready, a refresh that restores a previously reliable workhorse. Two OpenRouter entries resumed tool responses: nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning:free (1.5 s) and poolside/laguna-s-2.1:free (2.2 s). Their return adds low‑latency options for anyone who needs a quick function call without burning credits.

Latency quirks are worth noting. deepseek-ai/deepseek-v4.1-flash timed out after 60 seconds—a rare endurance test that turned a “free” label into a stubborn dead‑end. Meanwhile, the speed champions are still humming under a second: openai/gpt-oss-120b:free at 0.6 s, openai (Pollinations) at 0.3 s, and meta/llama-3.3-70b-instruct at 0.9 s. For fast, tool‑capable work, these stay in the rotation like a reliable quick‑pick line in a busy bar.

The churn column tells a consistent story: yesterday’s winners become today’s no‑shows. tokeness/free, poolside/laguna-xs-2.1:free, and the vision model meta/muse-glimmer-30b all slipped out of the free tier, leaving a gap that other models have yet to fill. If you’re building on free tiers, treat the roster as a living, breathing circuit—rotate early, rotate often, and expect the occasional blackout without warning.

Running the day’s verified set is a three‑step dance: clone the engine from github.com/fusionpoweredsoftware/anytimelime, set LIME_KEY to your OpenRouter key, and run ./lime.sh. It pulls today’s roster and spins through the passing models so no single free tier bears all the load. Your key stays on your own machine; the website never sees it.

Today's passing roster

openai — Pollinations · 0.3s · agentic 3/5
openai — Pollinations · 0.3s · agentic 3/5
openai/gpt-oss-120b:free — FastRouter · 0.6s · agentic 3/5
liquid/lfm-2.5-2.6b:free — openrouter · 0.6s · agentic 3/5
openrouter/free — openrouter · 0.6s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b — nvidia · 0.6s · agentic 3/5
typhoon-v2.5-30b-a3b-instruct — Typhoon (SCB 10X) · 0.7s · agentic 3/5
meta/llama-3.2-11b-vision-instruct — nvidia · 0.7s · agentic 3/5
openai/gpt-oss-20b:free — FastRouter · 0.8s · agentic 3/5
apodex/apodex-1.1-mini:free — openrouter · 1.0s · agentic 3/5
cohere/north-mini-code:free — openrouter · 1.0s · agentic 3/5
meta-llama/Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct — Hugging Face Inference · 1.1s · agentic 3/5
openai-fast — Pollinations · 1.1s · agentic 3/5
inclusionai/ling-3.0-flash-sante:free — openrouter · 1.1s · agentic 3/5
qwen/qwen3.5-4b-free — Mixlayer · 1.2s · agentic 3/5
zai-org/GLM-5.3-Flash — Gonka Broker · 1.2s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b — nvidia · 1.2s · agentic 3/5
qwen3-8b — Free.ai · 1.3s · agentic 3/5
dots-studio/dots-3-note-preview:free — openrouter · 1.5s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning:free — openrouter · 1.5s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free — openrouter · 1.5s · agentic 3/5
Qwen/Qwen3-Coder-480B-A35B-Instruct — HuggingFace Router · 1.6s · agentic 3/5
nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free — Naga AI · 1.6s · agentic 3/5
north-mini-code — TokenReply · 1.6s · agentic 3/5
stealth/space-bunny-alpha — openrouter · 1.7s · agentic 3/5
glm-4.7-flash — Zhipu AI (Z.ai) · 1.8s · agentic 3/5
glm-4.7-flash — Zhipu AI (Z.ai) · 1.8s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b:free — openrouter · 1.9s · agentic 3/5
aion-labs/aion-3.0 — AION Labs · 2.0s · agentic 3/5
intern-s2-preview — Intern AI · 2.0s · agentic 3/5
poolside/laguna-s-2.1:free — openrouter · 2.1s · agentic 3/5
tokeness/free — Tokeness · 2.2s · agentic 3/5
MiniMax-M2.7-Official — Pooled AI · 2.5s · agentic 3/5
meta/llama-3.2-90b-vision-instruct — nvidia · 2.5s · agentic 3/5
moonshotai/kimi-k3 — nvidia · 3.4s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning:free — openrouter · 3.9s · agentic 3/5
nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning-30b-a3b — nvidia · 4.5s · agentic 3/5
deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V3-0324 — HuggingFace Inference Router · 4.9s · agentic 3/5
agnes-3.0-flash — Agnes AI · 5.4s · agentic 3/5
MiniMaxAI/MiniMax-M2.7 — Gonka Broker · 5.8s · agentic 3/5
google/gemma-4-31b-it — nvidia · 9.2s · agentic 3/5
meta/muse-glimmer-30b — nvidia · 11.9s · 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	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
2.5	`MiniMax-M2.7-Official`	Pooled AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
5.8	`MiniMaxAI/MiniMax-M2.7`	Gonka Broker	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.6	`Qwen/Qwen3-Coder-480B-A35B-Instruct`	HuggingFace Router	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
5.4	`agnes-3.0-flash`	Agnes AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
2.0	`aion-labs/aion-3.0`	AION Labs	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	✓
0.9	`aisingapore/Qwen-SEA-LION-v4.5-27B-IT`	SEA-LION (AI Singapore)	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.0	`apodex/apodex-1.1-mini:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.3	`codestral-latest`	Mistral	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
4.9	`deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V3-0324`	HuggingFace Inference Router	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.6	`deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V3.1`	SiliconFlow	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`deepseek-ai/deepseek-v4-flash-0731`	NVIDIA NIM	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✓	✗
0.6	`glm-4.5-flash`	Zhipu AI (Z.ai)	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.8	`glm-4.7-flash`	Zhipu AI (Z.ai)	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	✗
1.1	`intern-latest`	Intern AI	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.1	`meta-llama/Llama-3.3-70B-Instruct`	Hugging Face Inference	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.4	`minimax/minimax-m3:free`	xKiro AI	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	✗
1.6	`nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free`	Naga AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.6	`north-mini-code`	TokenReply	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.1	`openai-fast`	Pollinations	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.6	`openai/gpt-oss-120b:free`	FastRouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.3	`openai`	Pollinations	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.2	`qwen/qwen3.5-4b-free`	Mixlayer	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.3	`qwen3-8b`	Free.ai	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.2	`qwen3.8-27b`	Yolo-Auto	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
2.2	`tokeness/free`	Tokeness	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.7	`typhoon-v2.5-30b-a3b-instruct`	Typhoon (SCB 10X)	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.2	`adept/fuyu-8b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`DeepSeek-V3.2`	sambanova	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.5	`deepseek-ai/DeepSeek-V4-Flash-0731`	Gonka Broker	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.0	`cohere/north-mini-code:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.3	`inclusionAI/Ling-flash-2.0`	SiliconFlow	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.8	`glm-4.7-flash`	Zhipu AI (Z.ai)	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	✗
2.0	`intern-s2-preview`	Intern AI	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	·
0.3	`openai`	Pollinations	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.8	`openai/gpt-oss-20b:free`	FastRouter	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	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.2	`zai-org/GLM-5.3-Flash`	Gonka Broker	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.5	`dots-studio/dots-3-note-preview:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`aisingapore/sea-lion-7b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`MiniMax-M3`	sambanova	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`google/gemma-4-26b-a4b-it:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`bigcode/starcoder2-15b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`gemma-4-31B-it`	sambanova	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.2	`google/gemma-4-31b-it:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	✓	✗
0.2	`databricks/dbrx-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.3	`gpt-oss-120b`	sambanova	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
1.1	`inclusionai/ling-3.0-flash-sante:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.1	`deepseek-ai/deepseek-coder-6.7b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	✗	✗
0.1	`inclusionai/ling-3.1-flash`	openrouter	untested	CARD	—	·	·	·
60.1	`deepseek-ai/deepseek-v4.1-flash`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.6	`liquid/lfm-2.5-2.6b:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	✓	✓
0.2	`google/codegemma-1.1-7b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.5	`nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	✓
0.2	`google/codegemma-7b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.5	`nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.2	`google/deplot`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.9	`nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.1	`google/diffusiongemma-26b-a4b-it`	nvidia	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	✓
0.1	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-content-safety:free`	openrouter	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`google/gemma-2b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
3.9	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-lightning:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✗
0.2	`google/gemma-3-12b-it`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.6	`openrouter/free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.1	`google/gemma-3-4b-it`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
2.1	`poolside/laguna-s-2.1:free`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✗	·	✗
9.2	`google/gemma-4-31b-it`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.6	`poolside/laguna-xs-2.1:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✓	·	✗
0.1	`google/recurrentgemma-2b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`qwen/qwen3.8-27b:free`	openrouter	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`ibm/granite-3.0-3b-a800m-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
1.7	`stealth/space-bunny-alpha`	openrouter	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.2	`ibm/granite-3.0-8b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`ibm/granite-34b-code-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`ibm/granite-8b-code-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`meta/codellama-70b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.7	`meta/llama-3.2-11b-vision-instruct`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
2.5	`meta/llama-3.2-90b-vision-instruct`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✗
0.2	`meta/llama2-70b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
11.9	`meta/muse-glimmer-30b`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.1	`microsoft/kosmos-2`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`microsoft/phi-3-vision-128k-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`microsoft/phi-3.5-moe-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`mistralai/codestral-22b-instruct-v0.1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`mistralai/mistral-7b-instruct-v0.3`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`mistralai/mistral-large-2-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`mistralai/mistral-large`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`mistralai/mixtral-8x22b-v0.1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`moonshotai/kimi-k2.6`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
3.4	`moonshotai/kimi-k3`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.1	`nv-mistralai/mistral-nemo-12b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`nvidia/ai-synthetic-video-detector`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/cosmos-reason2-8b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.5	`nvidia/ising-calibration-1.5-31b`	nvidia	text-only	FREE	—	✓	·	✓
0.1	`nvidia/llama-3.1-nemotron-51b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/llama-3.1-nemotron-70b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/llama-3.1-nemotron-ultra-253b-v1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/llama3-chatqa-1.5-70b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/mistral-nemo-minitron-8b-8k-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-3-nano-omni-30b-a3b-reasoning`	nvidia	yes (past)	DOWN	—	✗	·	✓
0.6	`nvidia/nemotron-3-super-120b-a12b`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
1.2	`nvidia/nemotron-3-ultra-550b-a55b`	nvidia	yes	FREE	3/5	✓	·	✓
0.2	`nvidia/nemotron-3.5-content-safety`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
4.5	`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	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`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	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/neva-22b`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.1	`nvidia/nvclip`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
0.2	`nvidia/riva-translate-4b-instruct-v1.1`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗
25.3	`nvidia/riva-translate-4b-instruct-v2`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	·
0.1	`nvidia/riva-translate-4b-instruct`	nvidia	untested	DOWN	—	✗	·	✗

42 made a tool call, 1 answered in text only, of 116 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.