Help, Your own AI
Run a free AI model on your own computer
On an Apple silicon Mac with 32 GB of memory or more, Onwarder can run Gemma 4 26B, a free open model, on the computer itself. Here is what that means, and why we do not recommend it on other machines yet.
Instead of a Claude or ChatGPT plan, you can run a free, open AI model on your own computer. When you use it there, your book never goes to an AI company, and it works offline once downloaded.
Like all AI in Onwarder, it is optional and off until you turn it on for a book. Onwarder never trains AI on your books.
Which computers it suits
Running a good model takes a lot of memory. We test before we recommend, and today we recommend one setup:
- An Apple silicon Mac (M1 or later) with 32 GB of memory or more. Onwarder recommends Gemma 4 26B, which is quick on these Macs and does a good job of the things Onwarder asks of it: reading new scenes, keeping story notes up to date and giving second opinions on continuity.
To see how much memory your Mac has, open the Apple menu and choose About This Mac.
On other computers, including Macs with less memory, Intel Macs, Windows and Linux, we do not recommend a local model yet. On these machines a model that fits is either too slow to be pleasant or not good enough to trust with your book, and Onwarder will tell you so plainly rather than offer you something disappointing. Use Codex or Claude Code instead, or leave AI off. We will widen this as we test more machines.
A local model is not as capable as the largest models from Anthropic or OpenAI. It is a good, private helper for notes and checks, not a replacement for your own judgement.
Set it up
- In the desktop app, open Settings, Writing help (AI), then What AI needs on this computer.
- Under AI to use, choose Local model. The setting says Runs on this computer.
- Onwarder shows the recommended model for your Mac and how much space it needs (Gemma 4 26B is about 17 GB). Download it. You can keep writing while it downloads.
- Choose a book and set what AI may do with it, as described in Use your own AI.
After the download, the model works with no internet connection at all.
Using it from your phone or the web
If you turn on Phone and web can use this computer, your phone and browser can send jobs to the model on your Mac. In that case the request travels from your phone to your computer through Onwarder, and the answer comes back the same way. It still never goes to an AI company, but it does leave the phone.
Removing it
To free the space, remove the model in the same settings. Turning AI off for every book also stops it being used.