Meta's family of open-source AI models, Llama, recently reached a significant milestone: over one billion downloads. This news was announced by CEO Mark Zuckerberg on the social media platform Threads. Compared to the 650 million downloads in December 2024, Llama's downloads surged by 153% in just three months.
Initially launched for researchers, Llama has gradually gained traction among global developers and AI enthusiasts. Ahmad Al-Dahle, VP of Meta's generative AI division, shared this achievement on LinkedIn, stating that Llama evolved from a research project to the most widely used open-source AI model in the past two years.
Al-Dahle expressed pride in his team's efforts, mentioning the two-year anniversary of Meta's generative AI organization on February 27th. He felt both exhilarated and humbled by the team's dedication to global developers, startups, and businesses. He believes Llama's download numbers represent trust in open-source AI and a shared belief in building a better future.
To further propel Llama's development, Meta plans to release several Llama models in the coming months. These include a "reasoning" model similar to OpenAI's o3-mini, and versions with multi-modal capabilities. Zuckerberg also hinted at models with "agent" capabilities, suggesting some models might possess autonomous operational abilities.
Last October, Zuckerberg confirmed during the company's Q3 earnings call that Llama4 would be released in early 2025. He anticipates smaller Llama4 models will be ready first, considering it a significant advancement involving new modalities, enhanced capabilities, stronger reasoning, and faster processing speeds.
While the Llama3 model marked a significant industry turning point, Zuckerberg expressed even greater enthusiasm for Llama4's development. He mentioned that Llama4's training involved over 100,000 H100 chips, far exceeding the scale known to other companies.
Llama already supports Meta's platforms like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, and plays a crucial role in the company's long-term AI strategy.
Key Highlights:
📈 Llama downloads surpass 1 billion, a 153% increase in three months.
👩💻 Meta plans to release various new models, including reasoning and multi-modal capabilities.
🚀 Zuckerberg is confident about Llama4's development, anticipating enhanced performance.