Why Do We Need Local LLMs Beyond Privacy?

Local large language models (LLMs) or self-hosted LLMs are typically recognised for their advantages concerning privacy; however, the potential applications for both users and organisations may extend beyond this aspect. These can be a saviour at a time when frequent updates to the cloud-hosted AI models, global outages, and surprise behaviour changes are becoming a challenge for the deployer.  Developments like these often come with a layer of unpredictability because the models evolve rapidly, sometimes daily, pushing updates that may improve accuracy in aggregate but introduce subtle regressions or latency issues in specific enterprise use cases. It’s a trade-off not everyone can afford, or should bear with. While a local LLM setup may not match the size of a hyperscaler or