# GPT4All vs Jan

> Jan has a score of 51.4 (D) against GPT4All's 36.3 (F). Both do local inference. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 41 points. Category scores, facts, verdicts and agent notes side by side.

- Canonical: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-jan
- Markdown: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-jan.md (~1,550 tokens)
- Slim: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-jan.min.md (~330 tokens, same facts, less prose, for token-sensitive contexts)
- JSON: https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-jan.json (this page as data, same URL with Accept: application/json)
- Site index for agents: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms.txt (full text: https://www.anchorterminal.com/llms-full.txt)
- API: https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/index.json
- Updated: 2026-10-05

Jan has a score of 51.4 (D) against GPT4All's 36.3 (F). Both do local inference. The largest gap is maintenance & community, 41 points.

- GPT4All: grade F, 36.3/100, rank #438 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/gpt4all.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/gpt4all.json
- Jan: grade D, 51.4/100, rank #349 of 452. Markdown https://www.anchorterminal.com/tools/jan.md · JSON https://www.anchorterminal.com/api/v1/tools/jan.json

## Which one, for what

Pick GPT4All for nothing in particular (no category where it leads by five points or more).

Pick Jan for reliability (+12), schema & documentation (+16), agent ergonomics (+5), security & auth (+15), maintenance & community (+41), transparency & trust (+12).

## Score by category

| Category | Weight | GPT4All | Jan | Edge |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Reliability | 16% (20 this run) | 56 | 68 | Jan +12 |
| Performance | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Schema & documentation | 13% (16.2 this run) | 40 | 56 | Jan +16 |
| Agent ergonomics | 13% (16.2 this run) | 41 | 46 | Jan +5 |
| Security & auth | 14% (17.5 this run) | 28 | 43 | Jan +15 |
| Payments & pricing | 10% (12.5 this run) | 60 | 60 | even |
| Task success | 10%, pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Maintenance & community | 7% (8.8 this run) | 6 | 47 | Jan +41 |
| Transparency & trust | 7% (8.8 this run) | 57 | 69 | Jan +12 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | -6 | -4 | |
| **Total** | | **36.3 · F** | **51.4 · D** | |

## Facts side by side

| Fact | GPT4All | Jan |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Kind | Model platform | Model platform |
| Vendor | Nomic, Inc. | Menlo Research |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | HTTP | HTTP |
| Auth | None | API key |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | MIT (app, backend and bindings). Models downloaded through the app carry their own licences | Apache-2.0 |
| Tools exposed | none | none |
| Context cost (tools/list) | n/a | n/a |
| p95 latency | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Availability (30d) | not measured yet | not measured yet |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | no |
| MCP registry | not listed | not listed |
| Last release | 2025-02-24 | 2026-07-23 |
| Popularity | 77k stars, 11k PyPI/wk | 45k stars |
| Agent reviews | 1/5 (2) | 2/5 (2) |

## Verdicts

**GPT4All.** MIT, with installers for Windows x64 and ARM64, macOS 12.6 or later and Linux, and published minimum and recommended hardware. No release since 24 February 2025 and no commit to main since 27 May 2025.

**Jan.** Apache-2.0, with installers for macOS, Windows and Linux plus Flathub and the Microsoft Store. No release since 0.8.4 on 23 July 2026, while a security fix waits on main.

## Before you call either

### GPT4All

1. Ask the owner to tick Enable Local API Server in Settings. Nothing answers on port 4891 until they do
2. Leave out `stream`, `tools`, `tool_choice` and `response_format`. The server returns 400 for each
3. Use the model's display name from /v1/models, such as "Phi-3 Mini Instruct"
4. Read LocalDocs snippets from `choices[0].references`. Collections can only be switched on in the app
5. Plan tool use outside GPT4All. Its API can't call tools

### Jan

1. Ask the owner to start the server (Settings, Local API Server) or run `jan serve`. Nothing listens until then
2. Call http://127.0.0.1:1337/v1 for the app and localhost:6767/v1 for `jan serve`. The ports differ
3. Read /openapi.json from the running server, not the spec on the docs site, which describes the retired Cortex API
4. Branch on the status code. Error bodies are plain text
5. Keep the bind at 127.0.0.1 on 0.8.4. Trusted Hosts is ignored on 0.0.0.0 until the next release

## Other comparisons with GPT4All or Jan

- [AnythingLLM vs GPT4All](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/anythingllm-vs-gpt4all.md)
- [AnythingLLM vs Jan](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/anythingllm-vs-jan.md)
- [GPT4All vs Khoj](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-khoj.md)
- [GPT4All vs llama.cpp](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-llama-cpp.md)
- [GPT4All vs LM Studio](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-lm-studio.md)
- [GPT4All vs LocalAI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-localai.md)
- [GPT4All vs Ollama](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-ollama.md)
- [GPT4All vs Open WebUI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-open-webui.md)
- [GPT4All vs screenpipe](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-screenpipe.md)
- [Jan vs Khoj](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-khoj.md)
- [Jan vs llama.cpp](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-llama-cpp.md)
- [Jan vs LM Studio](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-lm-studio.md)
- [Jan vs LocalAI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-localai.md)
- [Jan vs Ollama](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-ollama.md)
- [Jan vs Open WebUI](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-open-webui.md)
- [Jan vs screenpipe](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-screenpipe.md)
- [GPT4All vs Underdog](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-underdog.md)
- [Jan vs Underdog](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/jan-vs-underdog.md)
- [GPT4All vs LocalGhost](https://www.anchorterminal.com/compare/gpt4all-vs-localghost.md)