Head to head · Open-weight models you run yourself · October 2026 research run
Kimi K3.1 Pro vs ZAYA1-8B
ZAYA1-8B scores 61 (C) on agent readiness against Kimi K3.1 Pro's 48.6 (D), and leads in 2 of 4 scored categories. Kimi K3.1 Pro leads on agent interface. Both do open-weight models you run yourself.
Best open-weight models you download and run yourself for AI agents · All 6359 open weights comparisons
Which one, for what
Best for Operators with a multi-accelerator node who want Moonshot's newest open-weight model for coding and long agent sessions, and everyone else through an API
Ahead on
- Agent interface, 65 against 60
Watch for
1,561 GB of files, so it needs a node of eight large accelerators at least
ZAYA1-8B C
Best for People who want a small, fast reasoning model for maths and code and can live without tool calling
Ahead on
- Reach, 80 against 40
- Risk, 55 against 50
Watch for
Tool calling needs a parser that only Zyphra's vLLM fork has
Why the edge
Each category where one leads by five points or more, with the reason behind each side's score from its assessment. The numbers are in the table below; this is what they stand for.
Reach ZAYA1-8B +40
Kimi K3.1 Pro 40
Memory 0, the only build is Moonshot's 1,561 GB MXFP4 release, far above 256 GB. Runtimes 5, llama.cpp b12242 alone has the model code in a release, since vLLM's recipe needs 0.34.0 and SGLang's cookbook a branch. Builds 10, one precision. Terms 10, free commercial use below a model-as-a-service revenue threshold. Download 10, not gated. Hosted 5, Moonshot's API and Together serve it. 0 + 5 + 10 + 10 + 10 + 5 = 40.
ZAYA1-8B 80
Memory 30, the smallest build from Zyphra is the MXFP4-Experts repository, 5.85 GB, and 5.85 GB × 1.2 = 7.0 GB, within 16 GB. Runtimes 10, Released Transformers 5.22.2 has the zaya model and SGLang 0.5.23 has srt/models/zaya.py. Builds 15, Quantised builds from Zyphra at two precisions, FP8 and MXFP4 for the experts, each in its own repository. Terms 15, Apache 2.0 in the card's metadata, an OSI licence with nothing added. Download 10, the Hub API reports gated false for the model and its builds on 10 November 2026, so the files download with no account and nothing to accept. Hosted 0, Hugging Face maps no inference provider to it, and the card names no API. Zyphra's site lists a cloud product for its open models, which wasn't checked for this model. 30 + 10 + 15 + 15 + 10 + 0 = 80.
Risk ZAYA1-8B +5
Kimi K3.1 Pro 50
File safety 15, safetensors only, less 10 for remote code and prompts built by the repository's script. Provenance 15, Moonshot's own organisation with a hash on every file. Safety evaluation 10, Moonshot's own cyber benchmark results and nobody else's yet. Agent guidance 0, none on the card. Licence risk 10, the revenue threshold. Security programme 0, no way to report a flaw found. 15 + 15 + 10 + 0 + 10 + 0 = 50.
ZAYA1-8B 55
File safety 25, safetensors only, no .bin, .pt or .pth files and no Python in the repository. Provenance 15, the files sit in the Zyphra organisation, which the card ties to zyphra.com's blog post for the model (10). Safety evaluation 0, no safety results on the card. Agent guidance 0, the card has no limitations or safety section, and nothing on prompt injection, instruction priority or what the model refuses. Licence risk 15, Apache 2.0 has no use policy, threshold or change clause. Security programme 0, no way to report a flaw on the card, and www.zyphra.com has no security.txt. 25 + 15 + 0 + 0 + 15 + 0 = 55.
Agent interface Kimi K3.1 Pro +5
Kimi K3.1 Pro 65
Chat template 10, the format is only code to run. Tool-calling format 10, the parser is named in the runtimes' recipes and the card doesn't say how tools are declared. Trained tool calling 20, several calls a turn on Kimi K3's tools channel. Structured output 5, named among linked guides without the how. Reasoning control 10, reasoning_effort per request. Context 10, 1M tokens. 10 + 10 + 20 + 5 + 10 + 10 = 65.
ZAYA1-8B 60
Chat template 20, chat_template.jinja in the repository (10,700 characters). Tool-calling format 10, only the template and a fork say it. Trained tool calling 10, the template takes tools and renders calls, and the card recommends settings for agent use, but it doesn't say the model was trained for tool calling or for several calls in a turn, so the lower band. Structured output 0, Nothing on the card about JSON or schema-constrained output. Reasoning control 10, the template has an enable_thinking switch, and the card names the qwen3 reasoning parser, which returns the reasoning apart from the answer. Context 10, 131,072 positions in config.json, for an architecture Zyphra trained end to end, so the config is the model's own. 20 + 10 + 10 + 0 + 10 + 10 = 60.
Score by category
| Category | Weight this run | Kimi K3.1 Pro | ZAYA1-8B | Edge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Capability | 35%pending | pending | pending | not scored in this run |
| Reach | 25%25 | 40 | 80 | ZAYA1-8B +40 |
| Risk | 20%20 | 50 | 55 | ZAYA1-8B +5 |
| Agent interface | 10%10 | 65 | 60 | Kimi K3.1 Pro +5 |
| Documentation and upkeep | 10%10 | 51 | 50 | Kimi K3.1 Pro +1 |
| Negative events | ≤15 | 0 | 0 | |
| Total | D 48.6/100 | C 61/100 |
Facts side by side
| Fact | Kimi K3.1 Pro | ZAYA1-8B |
|---|---|---|
| Kind | Open-weight model | Open-weight model |
| Vendor | Moonshot AI | Zyphra |
| Hosted endpoint | no (local only) | no (local only) |
| Transports | ||
| Auth | None | None |
| Pricing | Free | Free |
| x402 | no | no |
| Licence | Kimi K3.1 Pro License (modified MIT) | Apache-2.0 |
| Read-only variant documented | no | no |
| llms.txt | no | no |
| Last release | 2026-11-05 | 2026-07-02 |
| Terms last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
| Privacy policy last updated | no document linked | no document linked |
Verdicts
Kimi K3.1 Pro
Moonshot's newest flagship, eight days old when read, for operators with a rack. Only llama.cpp has its model code in a release, with vLLM and SGLang support still on a release candidate and a branch. The licence is permissive below a revenue threshold, and Moonshot hasn't answered a discussion on the repository yet.
ZAYA1-8B
A small reasoning model trained from scratch by one lab, with a clean licence, 4-bit and FP8 builds and a team that answers questions. It's the hardest of the small models to run: its own architecture, a card that points at forks, and tool calling that needs a parser no release has. Little on limits, data or safety.
Before you call either
Kimi K3.1 Pro
- Use Moonshot's API or Together unless you have a node of eight B300-class accelerators
- With vLLM use 0.34.0 or later and the recipe's flags,
--tool-call-parser kimi_k3 --reasoning-parser kimi_k3 - Pass the whole assistant message back in later turns, reasoning_content and tool_calls included, as the card requires
- Set
reasoning_effortto low, high or max per request. Max is the default and thinking can't be turned off - Kimi K3's model code doesn't load it, because the attention layers changed
- Validate JSON output yourself, since the card doesn't document structured output for the weights
ZAYA1-8B
- Use it for reasoning, maths and code. Don't count on tool calling outside Zyphra's vLLM fork
- Run it with Transformers 5.22.2 or SGLang 0.5.23, which have the model built in
- Use temperature 1.0 and top_p 0.95 in general, and temperature 0.6 for agent and code work
- Download
Zyphra/ZAYA1-8B, not the legacy repository, for the released runtimes - The quantised repositories have no licence tag. The main one is Apache 2.0
Questions
Which is better for AI agents, Kimi K3.1 Pro or ZAYA1-8B?
ZAYA1-8B scores 61 (C) on agent readiness against Kimi K3.1 Pro's 48.6 (D), and leads in 2 of 4 scored categories. Kimi K3.1 Pro leads on agent interface.
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Machine-readable
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/compare/kimi-k3-1-pro-vs-zaya1-8b.md· slim.min.md· JSON.json(or sendAccept: text/markdown) - Each listing in full
/api/v1/tools/kimi-k3-1-pro.json·/api/v1/tools/zaya1-8b.json - From a terminal
anchor compare kimi-k3-1-pro zaya1-8b(the CLI) - Over MCP
compare_tools {"a": "kimi-k3-1-pro", "b": "zaya1-8b"}at/mcp, no key