The deciding difference is operational: Ollama can run on infrastructure you control, OpenRouter cannot. If that constraint is real for you, it settles the choice before anything else is considered.
One API key, several hundred models, automatic failover.
Open-weight models on your own machine. Nothing leaves the box.
| OpenRouter | Ollama | |
|---|---|---|
| Licence | Proprietary | Open source |
| Pricing | usage based | open source |
| Self-hostable | No | Yes |
| Languages | TypeScript, Python | TypeScript, Python |
| Install | — | brew install ollama |
| Keys required | OPENROUTER_API_KEY | None |
The deciding difference is operational: Ollama can run on infrastructure you control, OpenRouter cannot. If that constraint is real for you, it settles the choice before anything else is considered. OpenRouter: One API key, several hundred models, automatic failover. Ollama: Open-weight models on your own machine. Nothing leaves the box.
OpenRouter is a hosted service only. Ollama can run on your own infrastructure.
OpenRouter is proprietary (usage based). Ollama is open source (open source).
Every page here answers to Accept: text/markdown and returns the same content at roughly a tenth the tokens. No separate site, no toggle — same URL.
curl -s -H "Accept: text/markdown" https://newagent.build/compare/openrouter-vs-ollama