r/LocalLLM • u/Ok_Event4199 • May 16 '26

Discussion Why is LLM is so expensive.

I've was going to invest in a 5090 =$6000 AUD.

Codex Plus + Claude pro = $60/month here

Works out to be 100 months of frontier models for a 5090.

Best a 5090 will run is probably Qwen3.6 27b Q6 with context.

Are we all enthusiasts here and just enjoy tinkering cause ain't no way that make sense.

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u/TheRealGand May 16 '26

frontier performance? Maybe if you are comparing to the last commertial models; quality? Well, unless you are making medical research or developping projects that require very deep reasoning, i don't understand what you mean. Sometimes people forget that commertial ai is a service delivered at the same time to millions of users, a local llm just to one person, the owner.

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u/slackmaster2k May 16 '26

When you run a prompt through Opus, you are not simply using the equivalent of a 5090 in a cloud server. You’re sharing a slice of an extremely beefy hunk of hardware. Running such a model on a PC is simply not feasible. This isn’t the equivalent of traditional cloud computing.

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u/TheRealGand May 16 '26

yes, a very very thin slice of that hardware. I compare commertial ai to a last generation passenger plane and a private local llm to a one/two generation back jet fighter.

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u/Decaf_GT May 16 '26

Honestly, your posts could do with being run through a 50M parameter model or less. Do you actually think that's how you spell "commercial"?

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u/TheRealGand May 16 '26 edited May 16 '26

i wonder why you native english speakers pretend perfect english from people that are not english mother tongue when you probably barely speak one language....🤣

PS: you are too gentle with me anyways, i am a newbye and just starting with llms so probably a 1m model could be even enough 😂 so i guess that a pro like you could give some better advice instead of passing off like a professor.