Guides and explainers on running private, offline AI on your Mac — comparisons, concepts, how-tos, and per-Mac fit.
Outlier vs the alternativesHow a private, on-device model compares to cloud AI like Claude and ChatGPT — and to other local runners — on throughput, privacy, cost, and everyday friction. (15 guides)
Concepts: how local AI works on your MacPlain-English explainers on MLX, unified memory, quantization, and what actually happens when a model runs on Apple Silicon. (5 guides)
How-to guidesStep-by-step guides for installing Outlier and running local models on your Mac. (10 guides)
Will it run on your Mac?Which models run on which Macs — RAM needs, throughput, and tier fit across the Apple Silicon lineup. (20 guides)
Outlier runs entirely on your Mac. No prompts leave the device. macOS 12+ on Apple Silicon (arm64). Back to home.
New models worth running
Open weights ship constantly and most are not worth your disk. When one beats a tier Outlier already has, on hardware you already own, we say so and what it replaces. That is the only reason we email.
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