gpt-oss (OpenAI)

A Tier · 8.1/10

OpenAI's FIRST open-weight models -- gpt-oss-120b (single 80GB GPU, near parity with o4-mini on reasoning) and gpt-oss-20b (runs on 16GB edge devices). Apache 2.0. Launched 2025-08-05. gpt-oss-safeguard ships in 2026 as the safety-tuned variant

Last updated: 2026-04-17Free tier available

Score Breakdown

7.0

Ease of Use

8.5

Output Quality

10.0

Value

7.0

Features

Visit gpt-oss (OpenAI)

The Good and the Bad

What we like

+First-ever OpenAI open-weight release -- the brand halo alone makes this a mandatory evaluation for anyone working with open weights. The fact that OpenAI shipped it (after years of 'open-ness' debates) is itself historically significant
+gpt-oss-120b approaches o4-mini on reasoning benchmarks while running on a single 80GB GPU -- one of the best single-GPU frontier reasoning options available in the open-weight category
+gpt-oss-20b hits 16GB VRAM requirements (runs on consumer RTX 4080 / Apple Silicon M3 Ultra / similar) while roughly matching o3-mini -- a uniquely strong edge-deployable reasoning model
+Apache 2.0 license with no 'acceptable use policy' carve-outs -- genuinely permissive, unlike Llama's terms. Commercial deployments face zero licensing friction

What could be better

−Released 2025-08-05, so by April 2026 it is not the newest open-weight option -- DeepSeek V3.2, Qwen 3.5/3.6, GLM-5.1, and Granite 4 have all shipped later iterations. gpt-oss is still excellent but is no longer front-page hot
−No multimodal inputs -- text only. For vision or audio, pair with Qwen3.5-Omni, Llama 4 multimodal, or a separate vision model
−OpenAI has not published a follow-up to gpt-oss (no gpt-oss-v2 or similar as of April 2026). Single release, unclear if more is coming -- could be a one-time brand move rather than ongoing commitment
−gpt-oss-safeguard (the safety-tuned variant, 2026 release) is narrower in capability than the base models -- for research / red-team / full-capability work, use the original releases

Pricing

Self-hosted (Free, Apache 2.0)

✓First OpenAI open-weight release ever
✓Weights on Hugging Face + Ollama + llama.cpp + vLLM
✓Apache 2.0 license -- unrestricted commercial use
✓No telemetry, no phone-home, runs fully offline

API (OpenRouter / Together / Fireworks)

$0.15/per 1M input tokens (120b tier)

✓gpt-oss-120b: ~$0.15 in / $0.60 out
✓gpt-oss-20b: ~$0.07 in / $0.30 out
✓Competitive per-token pricing across hosted providers

System Requirements

Hardware needed to self-host. Min = smallest viable setup (usually heavy quantization). Max = full-precision / production-grade.

Model variant	Min	Max
gpt-oss-120b (flagship reasoning)Apache 2.0 -- unrestricted commercial use	1× 80 GB GPU (H100 / A100 FP16)	2× H100 for production serving
gpt-oss-20b (edge reasoning)Runs locally on a decent consumer setup; Apple M3 Ultra handles it well	16 GB VRAM (RTX 4080) or 32 GB Apple Silicon unified memory	1× A100 40 GB FP16
gpt-oss-safeguard (2026 safety-tuned variant)Narrower capability than base; tuned for deployment in safety-sensitive contexts	Same as base (120b or 20b)	Same as base

Known Issues

Initial community quantizations (Q4 and below) showed degradation on reasoning tasks versus FP16 -- the MoE routing layers are sensitive to quantization. Q5/Q6 is the practical sweet spot for gpt-oss-120bSource: Reddit r/LocalLLaMA, Hugging Face discussions · 2025-09
gpt-oss did not make the transition to OpenAI's GPT-5.x tokenizer -- still uses the older tokenizer from the GPT-4 era. Compatible with existing tooling but slightly less token-efficient than frontier OpenAI API modelsSource: OpenAI open-models docs · 2025-08

Best for

Developers who want OpenAI-brand open-weight reasoning models for self-hosting or fine-tuning. Particularly good for single-GPU deployments (gpt-oss-120b on one 80GB card) or edge-device reasoning (gpt-oss-20b on 16GB consumer GPUs / Apple Silicon). Also good as a reliable baseline when comparing newer open-weight releases.

Not for

Anyone needing absolute bleeding-edge quality (DeepSeek V3.2 / V4, GLM-5.1, Qwen 3.6 are all stronger on most benchmarks as of April 2026). Also not for multimodal use cases -- gpt-oss is text-only.

Our Verdict

gpt-oss remains historically important as the first OpenAI open-weight release (August 2025), and the 120b model on a single 80GB GPU is still one of the cleanest single-card frontier-reasoning options in the open-weight category. By April 2026 it is no longer the bleeding edge -- DeepSeek V3.2, GLM-5.1, and Qwen 3.6 have all shipped stronger models -- but gpt-oss's combination of OpenAI brand + genuine Apache 2.0 + single-GPU 120b sizing makes it a durable default in any open-weight evaluation matrix. Worth adding to any shortlist; probably not first pick unless the OpenAI brand association matters for your stack.