How to Use AI Locally

The Privacy Trade-Off

Using AI online is convenient and free, but it comes at a cost: your data. When you use cloud-based AI, your questions and the answers are stored on remote servers. For general questions, this is often fine. However, if you are chatting about private details, personal matters, or sensitive work projects, you need a different approach.

The only way to use AI with complete privacy is to run it locally. This means the AI lives on your own machine, and your conversations never leave your device.

The Easy Way: Ollama

Historically, running AI locally was difficult and required technical expertise. Today, thanks to tools like Ollama, it is as simple as installing a free application. Ollama allows you to download and run powerful Large Language Models (LLMs) directly on your computer.

With Ollama, you get the privacy of a local connection with the power of modern AI. For more details on what LLMs are and how to get started, visit our Lexicon page.

What You Need to Get Started

Local AI is memory-hungry. To run models smoothly, your computer needs a decent amount of RAM (Random Access Memory) and a good processor. While it is possible to upgrade the graphics card on a desktop workstation, this is a technical process.

Because the goal is to make AI simple and accessible for seniors and beginners, the focus is on the easiest path to privacy: using a computer that is powerful enough out of the box. For hardware specifics, see why MacBook and Mac Mini are Best.