M
MOpen-weight AI models, chat and coding agent you can run on your own infrastructure
Free, from $14.99/mo
LM Studio vs Tabby
Pricing, features, platforms and who each one suits — side by side.
L
Choose LM Studio if…
- you need an API to build on
- you're in its core audience: developers, privacy-conscious professionals
T
Choose Tabby if…
- you want the lower entry price ($19/mo vs $20/mo)
- you want open source you can self-host or audit
- you work on Self-hosted, VS Code, JetBrains
- you're in its core audience: software developers, small development teams
Side by side
Feature LM Studio Tabby
Pricing modelFreemiumFreemium
Starting price$20/mo$19/mo
Free plan
Free trial
API
Open source
Trains AI on your contentNo—
Data retentionPrompts and responses not retained; cloud requests processed transiently (Zero Data Retention)—
Security and complianceGDPR—
Updates, last 90 days7—
Works fully offline—
Optional cloud models—
OpenAI-compatible API—
Apple Silicon acceleration—
Team admin / SSO—
Platforms—Self-hosted, VS Code, JetBrains, Web
CategoryLocal & Open ModelsCode Assistants
CompanyElement Labs, Inc.TabbyML, Inc.
Based inUnited States—
Founded——
Part of——
Key features
L LM Studio
- Bionic agent creates and edits documents, slides and PDFs
- Coding, automation and computer control tasks
- In-app download of local LLMs
- Runtime powered by MLX and llama.cpp
- Real-time on-device voice transcription in multiple languages
- Optional US-hosted open frontier models with zero data retention
- LM Link connects up to 5 devices on Free
- JavaScript and Python SDKs plus the lms CLI
T Tabby
- Context-aware code completion in the IDE
- Answer Engine for coding questions with cited sources
- Inline chat inside the code editor
- Context providers connecting docs and data sources
- Self-hosting on consumer-grade GPUs
- No external database or cloud service required
- Pochi agent for planning and executing tasks
- SSO, usage analytics and telemetry policies on Enterprise
Plans and prices
From each vendor's site. Prices change — confirm before buying.
LM Studio
Free$0
Bionic+$20 USD/month
Pro$100 USD/month
Tabby
CommunityFree
Team$19/mo per seat
EnterpriseCustom
Tabby Cloud (Pochi)Usage-based
Strengths and limitations
LM Studio
- Free plan includes the agent, local models and offline transcription
- Voice data is processed locally
- Cloud services are stated to use Zero Data Retention
- SDKs for JavaScript and Python plus a CLI
- Hosted frontier models require a paid plan starting at $20/month
- Free plan has only limited web search
- Team subscription plans are not yet available
Tabby
- Open source and self-hostable
- Free Community plan for up to 5 users
- Supports VS Code, Neovim, Eclipse and many JetBrains IDEs
- Tab Completion on Tabby Cloud is free with no usage limits
- Free plan is limited to 5 users
- SSO and telemetry policy controls require the Enterprise plan
- Enterprise pricing is only available by contacting sales
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Built from each vendor's public website; we haven't tested them hands-on. Editorial policy