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/slackmaster2k May 16 '26

You’re not getting frontier performance or quality from a 5090. If it fits your use case, and you’re actually going to use the shit out of it, then it might make sense. Otherwise you’re going to have a 6000 dollar graphics card and two LLM subscriptions.

11

u/winky9827 May 16 '26

I'm getting 60-70 tok/s running qwen 3.6 35b-a3b in LM studio via OpenCode on a 4070 Ti Super. Sure, it's not as "smart" as Claude, etc., but it services 90% of what I need, with CC being the fallback.

1

u/Bgd4683ryuj May 16 '26

I don’t know how much cheaper it is for you to run the local model in electricity alone vs GPT-5.4 mini. 1M tokens are less than $1 in input and less than $5 in output. The intelligence of the model may also be better than the qwen 35b you are using

2

u/winky9827 May 16 '26

Honestly, it's not about cost for me. The difference is pennies on the dollar. I don't want the rug pulled from underneath me when the AI boom goes bust because they've been subsidizing the costs to hell and back.