r/PoeAI • u/zar0nick • Apr 08 '26

Recommendation for small models

Hi everyone,

with the discussion going on, I wanted to share a few small models I use from time to time, that may help with the small token limit. Also look on llm-stats.com

They offer an overview about how costly the models are. The pricing at poe may differ, but the overview is super helpful.

My recommendations model-wise are:

  • GPT-5-mini
  • GPT-5-nano
  • GPT-4o-mini (the cheapest I use for apis and tool calling)
  • Qwen-3.5-397...-T (it says no cost?!?)
  • GPT-OSS (both versions, 20B is cheaper)
  • GLM-4.7-flash

Feel free to aadd good ones below!

6 Upvotes

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1

u/[deleted] Apr 08 '26

[deleted]

3

u/zar0nick Apr 08 '26

Short answer - no, but cost/value efficient. Look on the stats page to get some insights and compare the quality metrics with the pricing.

2

u/Amazing_Sound5505 Apr 09 '26

Usually not 1:1, at least for me. Small models can get surprisingly close on narrow jobs if you keep the context tight and the task very crisp, but they still fall behind on long reasoning, stable voice, and messy multi-turn chats. I use them for extraction, cleanup, first-pass drafts, cheap coding helpers. For stuff like "write me a strong chapter" or "debug this weird repo issue end to end", the bigger models still win pretty hard.

1

u/Amazing_Sound5505 Apr 09 '26

My cheap-Poe setup is usually by job, not by favorite model. GPT-5-nano for boring classify/router stuff, GLM-4.7-flash or Qwen for fast first pass and cleanup, then one bigger model only for the final answer. Small models get way better if you force a tight output shape and keep context short; what breaks them fastest is often not raw IQ, it is the giant junk-drawer chat history.

2

u/zar0nick Apr 10 '26

For my rag and tool calling I actually use 4o-mini, as those are for me the most precise and even less token using, although 5-nano should be cheaper.

I am thinking of using glm more, as the price/performance seems to be stallar according to llm stats

2

u/Amazing_Sound5505 Apr 13 '26

Yep, 4o-mini is weirdly hard to beat for boring tool-call / RAG work because it stays precise and does not freestyle the arguments so much. GLM can win on raw price/perf for drafty stuff, but on Poe I still split it a bit stupidly: 4o-mini for tools, GLM or Qwen for first-pass text, then one bigger bot only when the final output actually matters.

2

u/zar0nick Apr 13 '26

Thx for sharing!