Free tool · Live-verified
Free models, actually called.
A short list that earns the word free. Every model below carries a genuine
$0 price and the :free suffix on OpenRouter — and every one was
called with a real request during the last verification run. A catalog entry is not
proof, and zero token pricing is not the same as free: models billed per second or
per clip also report a price of zero. So we call them.
0Listed free
0Answering now
—Last verified
—Test method
What counts as free. Two conditions, both required: the
:free slug suffix and a $0 per-token price in the live
catalog. A model that fails either is not listed — which is why
this page is short while “free model” listicles are long.
How the test works. A real chat-completions call
(temperature 0.1, small token budget) is made to each model on the
verified date shown above. Answers now = it replied.
Rate limited = the free quota was spent at test time (worth
retrying later). Restricted = free, but not callable as a plain
chat model — hover any badge for the provider’s own error text.
Statuses drift in both directions. Upstream quotas recover as
often as they die, so a rate-limited or non-answering row is worth
retrying rather than treating as dead. For real-time status, check
OpenRouter’s
live free-models collection — this page is the verified
snapshot, rebuilt every Monday.
Why your favourite model is missing. It either lost its free
tier, or it is only free through an aggregator we cannot verify with
a single key. We list only what we can call ourselves — short
list, zero noise.