Jan vs LM Studio
Price, platforms and features side by side. The table says where each price was read and when.
LM Studio
Desktop app for running open AI models on your own computer
Free plan · from $20/mo
Where they differ
- Jan is free. LM Studio starts at $20 per month (Bionic+, for cloud models).
- Jan is open source, according to its own site.
- Jan also covers AI search.
- LM Studio also covers AI agents.
In commonFree planmacOSWindowsLinuxWorks offlineLocal-firstPublic APIAI featuresChat assistant
At a glance
| Jan | LM Studio | |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | Free | Free plan |
| Starts at | Free | $20 per month (Bionic+, for cloud models) |
| Free plan | Jan is free and open source under the Apache 2.0 license, and no account is needed. Cloud models need an API key from the provider you connect. | LM Studio is free for home and work use. Bionic's Free plan covers the agent, local models, offline voice transcription, LM Link for up to 5 devices and limited web search. |
| Free trial | None listed | None listed |
| macOS | ||
| Windows | ||
| Linux | ||
| Made by | Menlo Research | Element Labs, Inc. |
| Price read from | jan.ai | lmstudio.ai |
| Checked | Oct 5, 2026 | Oct 5, 2026 |
Who each one suits
Jan
- Running open models offline on your own computer
- People who want one desktop app for local and cloud models
- Developers who want a local OpenAI-compatible endpoint
LM Studio
- Running open models privately on a Mac, Windows or Linux computer
- Developers who want a local OpenAI-like endpoint for their own tools
- Agent work on code and documents with open models, through Bionic
Worth knowing
Jan
- Desktop only, on macOS, Windows and Linux. Intel-based Macs are not supported.
- Local models need memory: Jan's Mac guide suggests 8GB of RAM for 3B models, 16GB for 7B models and 32GB for 13B models.
- Cloud models need your own API key from each provider, and those providers see the messages you send them.
- Cowork and the standalone Jan Agent are previews on nightly builds, and the memory feature is marked as coming soon.
LM Studio
- LM Studio itself is desktop only; on iPhone and iPad its models are reached through the separate Locally app. Intel-based Macs are not supported.
- Local models need capable hardware: the docs recommend 16GB of RAM or more, and on Windows at least 4GB of dedicated VRAM.
- The paid plans cover cloud models in LM Studio Bionic, a separate app; cloud use needs an LM Studio account with available credits.
- LM Link is in preview and free for now; LM Studio says free and paid LM Link plans will follow at general availability.
Key features
Jan
- Local models
- Downloads and runs open models such as Llama, Gemma and Qwen from Hugging Face using llama.cpp or MLX. The Hub shows whether each model fits your hardware.
- Cloud providers with your own key
- Connects to OpenAI, Anthropic, Gemini, Mistral AI, Groq, OpenRouter and Azure OpenAI, or to any OpenAI- or Anthropic-compatible endpoint, using an API key you supply.
- Built-in web search
- Web search and page fetch tools are on by default for models that support tool use. They run through a keyless Exa endpoint, so no API key or MCP server is needed.
- Projects and assistants
- Projects group conversations under shared instructions and files, and custom assistants keep their own instructions for recurring kinds of work.
- Local API server
- A built-in OpenAI-compatible server at localhost:1337 lets other applications use the models running in Jan, and Claude Code can be set to use them as its backend.
- MCP connectors and Cowork preview
- MCP servers add tools such as code execution and databases. Cowork, which works through multi-step tasks on files and commands, ships only in nightly builds as a preview.
LM Studio
- Local model runner
- Downloads and runs open models such as gpt-oss, Qwen, Gemma and DeepSeek on your own hardware with llama.cpp, plus Apple's MLX on Apple Silicon Macs.
- Offline chat with documents
- Chat and document chat (RAG) run on the device. The docs say nothing entered into a local chat or dropped into it as a document leaves the machine.
- Local API server and SDKs
- Serves models on OpenAI-like endpoints on localhost or the local network, with Python and TypeScript SDKs, the lms command line tool and the headless llmster daemon for servers.
- MCP client
- MCP servers can be installed in LM Studio so that local models can call the tools they provide.
- LM Link
- Links your own machines over an end-to-end encrypted connection built on Tailscale, so a model on a remote device can be used as if local, including from an iPhone through the Locally app. In preview.
- LM Studio Bionic agent
- A separate app that works on code and on documents, slides and spreadsheets inside projects, using local models, LM Link models or cloud models billed in credits.
Plans
Jan
Free$0
The full desktop app for macOS, Windows and Linux, with local models, cloud provider connections and the local API server.
LM Studio
Free$0
Local models through llama.cpp and MLX, the Bionic agent, offline voice transcription, LM Link for up to 5 devices and limited web search.
Bionic+$20
per month
Adds US-hosted open source cloud models such as Kimi K3 and DeepSeek V4 Flash, discounted bulk tokens, and web search with page extraction.
Pro$100
per month
Everything in Bionic+ with 5x the usage limits, discounted bulk tokens and early access to new features.
