Models / Z.AI/ GLM 4.6

GLM 4.6

Z.AI · released Sep 29, 2025 · zai-org/GLM-4.6

Input: text. Output: text.InputOutput
Type
Open weightsMIT License
Params
357B
Context
205K

about 154K words of context

Our take

Written Aug 3, 2026

GLM 4.6 is a large downloadable text model from Z.AI with a permissive MIT licence and a 204,800-token request limit. Its measured coding skill sits well above its general-chat level, though creative writing and web development are clear weak points.

Who should pick it

Pick this for coding tasks where its measured score peaks, or for hard-prompt reasoning near that same level. Use it when you need a wide request limit with no multimodal requirement, or when a permissive licence matters for commercial redistribution. Skip it if you need image, audio or video input, if creative writing quality is critical, or if you want a clear price-to-speed winner among hosts.

The case for it

  • Strongest measured skill is coding, with a 34-point lift over its general-chat score.
  • Permissive MIT licence with no commercial restrictions.
  • Wide request limit for a 357-billion-parameter downloadable model, at 204,800 tokens.
  • Broad benchmark coverage across seven Arena categories.

The case against it

  • Web development coding is a clear weak point, 120 points below its peak coding score.
  • Creative writing lags all other measured domains, 22.9 points below its overall average.
  • No disclosed active-parameter count, leaving efficiency unverified.
00

How good is it?

IntelligencePuzzles, maths, exam questions

3 of 5

Arena Text (overall)57th of 143 · 1425

Arena Hard Prompts 59th of 143Arena Maths 59th of 139

CodingWriting and fixing code on its own

3 of 5

Arena Coding67th of 143 · 1459

Arena Code (WebDev) 56th of 74

AgenticPlanning, calling tools, staying on task

Scored, not ratedSWE-bench Verified · 13th of 39 · 68.2

GLM 4.6 is not on Arena Agent (IPS), which is where the rating would come from, so there is no rating here. It is on SWE-bench Verified, in 13th of 39 with 68.2.

WritingWe do not rate this

Scored, not ratedThe placings are on the right.

Two boards come close and neither tests writing: Arena Creative Writing asks people which of two replies they prefer, and LiveBench Language tests whether a model understood a passage. So we show where GLM 4.6 placed and give it no mark out of five.

Arena Creative Writing 53rd of 143 · 1402.2
Also scored, on boards we give no mark for
Arena Instruction Following 57th of 143

These tests check whether a model follows instructions — a precondition for all the work above, but not a measure of how well that work is done, which is why they get no rating.

Every published score for this model8 scoresEvery figure we hold, from 8 boards, with who ran it and a link to the source — including the boards no rating above is built on.
1459independentsource ↗
1442independentsource ↗
1420.1independentsource ↗
1339independentsource ↗
68.2independentsource ↗
01

Can you run it yourself?

Fits in memory
weights load entirely on the card
Spills to system RAM
some weights offload; much slower
Too large
will not load even with offload
est
size is calculated; the verdict could change by 10%
A card many people ownToo large

GeForce RTX 4090 · 24 GB

Weights at Q4_K_M225 / 24 GBest
Usable contextNot calculated for spilled setups
Decode speedNot estimated for spilled setups

Too large for this card. The weights do not fit even with part of them offloaded to system memory.

One step upToo large

Apple M1 Pro (16-core GPU) · 32 GB

Weights at Q4_K_M225 / 32 GBest
Usable contextNot calculated for spilled setups
Decode speedNot estimated for spilled setups

Too large for this card. The weights do not fit even with part of them offloaded to system memory.

Comfortable fit

On a MacFits in memory

Apple M3 Ultra (80-core GPU) · 512 GB

Weights at Q4_K_M225 / 512 GBest
Spare memory150.3 GB spare
Usable context131K of 205K
Decode speed2 tok/sest

Room to spare. 150.3 GB spare means a 10% error in the size would not change the answer.

Your hardware
Checking your profile…

Memory use by level

Against a 24 GB card.

Q4_K_M
recommended
225 GBest
Too large
Q5_K_M
263.9 GBest
Too large
Q8_0
394.3 GBest
Too large

All 3 sizes here are calculated, not measured. We hold no measured file for this model, so each size comes from the parameter count and every verdict above inherits that uncertainty.

Check against your own machine → · All 71 devices, with every size →

02

Or rent it from someone else

Cheapest published offer

Cheapest of 8 live listings. Picked at the widest standard context we hold, within one quantisation slice, so the numbers beside it are a price one host actually charges.

per 1M tokens
$0.50 in / $2.00 out
Context served
205K
Throughput
Not measured
Current provider offers with price, context and prompt-privacy answers
ProviderIn / out per 1M tokensContextThroughputTrains on promptsLogs promptsZero retention
Venice AIfp4$0.43 / $1.75198K17 tok/sNoNoConfirmed
DeepInfrafp4$0.50 / $2.00203Knot measuredUnknownUnknownUnknown
DeepInfrafp4$0.50 / $2.00203K23 tok/sNoNoConfirmed
OpenRouter$0.50 / $2.00205Knot measuredUnknownUnknownUnknown
Z.AIfp4$0.60 / $2.20203K36 tok/sNoNoConfirmed
Novita AI$0.55 / $2.20205Knot measuredUnknownUnknownUnknown
Novita AIbf16$0.55 / $2.20205K25 tok/sNoNoConfirmed
AtlasCloudfp8$0.60 / $2.20203K24 tok/sNoYesunknown periodUnknown

Across the 8 listings we hold: 5 say they do not train on prompts, 0 say they do and 3 do not say. 4 appear in the zero-retention registry we check; the rest are unknown to us rather than confirmed either way.

What each host's API supports

From the parameter list each endpoint publishes. Streaming is omitted: nothing we hold reports it, for any model.

Supported
Not supported
Not published
host gave no parameter list
API features per host
ProviderTool callingJSON outputStrict schema
Venice AIfp4
DeepInfrafp4
DeepInfrafp4
OpenRouter
Z.AIfp4
Novita AI
Novita AIbf16
AtlasCloudfp8

Tool calling: 6 of 8 listings say yes, 2 publish no parameter list. JSON output: 5 of 8 listings say yes, 1 says no, 2 publish no parameter list. Strict schema: 3 of 8 listings say yes, 3 say no, 2 publish no parameter list.

03

Models people weigh against GLM 4.6

04

When we formed this view

Dates behind this page

Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1459 on Arena Codingleaderboard
Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1402.2 on Arena Creative Writingleaderboard
Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1442 on Arena Hard Promptsleaderboard
Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1415 on Arena Instruction Followingleaderboard
Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1420.1 on Arena Mathsleaderboard
Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1425 on Arena Text (overall)leaderboard
Aug 2, 2026BenchmarkScored 1339 on Arena Code (WebDev)leaderboard
Jul 26, 2026ListedListed on LLMapfirst indexed by our pipeline
Sep 30, 2025BenchmarkScored 68.2 on SWE-bench Verifiedleaderboard
Sep 29, 2025AnnouncedGLM 4.6 announced by Z.AI

Prices last checked 37h ago

What we do not know about this model yet

  • We hold no measured file for it, so all 3 sizes on this page are calculated from the parameter count.
  • 2 of 8 listings publish no parameter list, so what their API accepts is unknown to us.
  • Nothing we hold says whether an endpoint streams, so we do not show it either way.
  • 3 of 8 listings do not say whether they train on prompts.
05

Licence and identifiers

What the licence allowsMIT License, what it allows commercially, and the identifiers you need to pull this model — its Hugging Face repo, our slug and a machine-readable card.

Licence

MIT License

permissiveCommercial use allowed

Fully permissive: do anything with attribution. No patent grant, unlike Apache-2.0.

Identifiers

Hugging Face
zai-org/GLM-4.6
Architecture
Mixture of experts
Modality record
text->text
Catalogue slug
z-ai-glm-4-6

Machine-readable model card (omc.json) →

Something wrong on this page? Tell us