Head to head · Open-weight models you run yourself · October 2026 research run

LFM3-Audio-2B vs LFM3-Omni-2B

LFM3-Audio-2B and LFM3-Omni-2B score within a point of each other on agent readiness, 61 (C) and 61 (C). Both do open-weight models you run yourself.

Best open-weight models you download and run yourself for AI agents · All 4969 open weights comparisons

Which one, for what

LFM3-Audio-2B C

Best for Voice agents on a laptop or phone that need speech in, speech out and tool calls from one small model

Ahead on

  • Agent interface, 85 against 70

Watch for

Only llama.cpp and Ollama run it in a release, though the card lists vLLM and SGLang

LFM3-Omni-2B C

Best for Voice and camera agents on a laptop or phone that want one small model for hearing, seeing, speaking and calling tools

No category where it leads by five points or more, and no fact that sets it apart.

Watch for

Only llama.cpp and Ollama run it in a release

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.

Agent interface LFM3-Audio-2B +15

LFM3-Audio-2B 85

Chat template 20, chat_template.jinja in the repository (9,328 characters), with roles, audio, tools, deferred tools and tool results. Tool-calling format 25, the card and Liquid's tool-use page document tools passed through tools= in apply_chat_template, calls returned as XML and results sent back as tool messages. Trained tool calling 20, the template loops over every entry in an assistant turn's tool_calls, so several calls fit in one turn, and the card names turning spoken requests into tool calls as one of its four uses. Structured output 5, the card says the model is designed for structured outputs without saying how to ask for JSON. Liquid's API guide documents response_format with lfm3-1.7b as its example. Reasoning control 10, the card documents reasoning per request for text replies: the caller prefills the assistant turn with an open think tag to let the model reason, or a closed one for a direct answer, with a use_thinking example. Context 5, 32K tokens of input and output per the card. 20 + 25 + 20 + 5 + 10 + 5 = 85.

LFM3-Omni-2B 70

Chat template 20, chat_template.jinja in the repository (13,513 characters), with roles, images, video and audio, tools, deferred tools and tool results. Tool-calling format 25, the card and Liquid's tool-use page document tools passed through tools= in apply_chat_template, calls returned as XML and results sent back as tool messages. Trained tool calling 20, the template loops over every entry in an assistant turn's tool_calls, so several calls fit in one turn, and the card documents tool calling from spoken or written requests. Structured output 0, the card doesn't mention JSON or structured output for this model. Reasoning control 0, the card says this is a non-reasoning model and that enable_thinking=True is not supported, so there is no thinking to turn off or budget. Context 5, 32K tokens of input and output per the card. 20 + 25 + 20 + 0 + 0 + 5 = 70.

Score by category

CategoryWeight this runLFM3-Audio-2BLFM3-Omni-2BEdge
Capability35%pendingpendingpendingnot scored in this run
Reach25%258080even
Risk20%204040even
Agent interface10%108570LFM3-Audio-2B +15
Documentation and upkeep10%105249LFM3-Audio-2B +3
Negative events≤1500
TotalC 61/100C 61/100

Facts side by side

FactLFM3-Audio-2BLFM3-Omni-2B
KindOpen-weight modelOpen-weight model
VendorLiquid AILiquid AI
Hosted endpointno (local only)no (local only)
Transports
AuthNoneNone
PricingFreeFree
x402nono
LicenceLFM Open License v1.0 (free commercial use below $10M annual revenue)LFM Open License v1.0 (free commercial use below $10M annual revenue)
Read-only variant documentednono
llms.txtyesyes
Last release2026-11-032026-11-03
Terms last updatedno document linkedno document linked
Privacy policy last updatedno document linkedno document linked

Verdicts

LFM3-Audio-2B

A 2B model that listens and speaks on an 8 GB machine, transcribes and translates 19 languages and turns spoken requests into tool calls. Only llama.cpp and Ollama run it in a release. The context is 32K, voice chat is English only, Liquid hasn't answered the repository's questions, and there are no safety results or data sources.

LFM3-Omni-2B

One 2.17B model that sees, listens and talks on an 8 GB machine and turns spoken requests into tool calls. Only llama.cpp and Ollama run it in a release. The context is 32K, it doesn't reason, Liquid hasn't answered a question on the repository, and there are no safety results or data sources.

Before you call either

LFM3-Audio-2B

  1. Start it with llama-server -hf LiquidAI/LFM3-Audio-2B-GGUF:Q4_K_M --jinja or ollama run lfm3-audio
  2. llama.cpp ships examples/realtime_client.py for live speech with this model
  3. Prefill the assistant turn with an open think tag to let it reason before a text reply
  4. The context is 32K
  5. Voice chat is English only, while transcription, synthesis and translation cover 19 languages and locales
  6. Liquid doesn't recommend it for agentic coding or complex multi-step reasoning

LFM3-Omni-2B

  1. Start it with llama-server -hf LiquidAI/LFM3-Omni-2B-GGUF:Q4_K_M --jinja or ollama run lfm3-omni
  2. Greedy decoding for text. For speech use audio_temperature 0.4 and audio_repetition_penalty 1.2, per the card
  3. The context is 32K, and llama.cpp samples video at 2 frames a second up to 384 frames
  4. Parse tool calls yourself from the XML it returns
  5. It doesn't reason, so don't pass enable_thinking
  6. Validate JSON output yourself

Questions

Which is better for AI agents, LFM3-Audio-2B or LFM3-Omni-2B?

LFM3-Audio-2B and LFM3-Omni-2B score within a point of each other on agent readiness, 61 (C) and 61 (C).

Other comparisons with LFM3-Audio-2B or LFM3-Omni-2B

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