AI Router
A layer that picks the cheapest capable model for each request, saving cost and latency.
/ quick answer
An AI router inspects the incoming prompt and dispatches it to the smallest model that can handle it — a small local model for classification, a mid-tier for drafting, a frontier model only for hard reasoning. Products: OpenRouter, Portkey, LiteLLM.
What is AI Router?
An AI router inspects the incoming prompt and dispatches it to the smallest model that can handle it — a small local model for classification, a mid-tier for drafting, a frontier model only for hard reasoning. Products: OpenRouter, Portkey, LiteLLM.
What is an example of AI Router?
A support agent routes 80% of tickets to GPT-4o mini, 15% to GPT-4o, and 5% to Claude Opus, cutting bill by ~70% with no quality drop.
Why does AI Router matter for AI and automation?
A layer that picks the cheapest capable model for each request, saving cost and latency. It connects to the workflows, prompts and tool stacks linked on this page, so you can move from definition to execution without leaving Onexial.
/ continue exploring
Related concepts
The vocabulary this page depends on.
- →Model Routing
Sending each request to the cheapest model that can handle it.
- →Quantization
Shrinking a model by lowering weight precision.
- →Inference
Running a trained model to produce outputs.
- →Cost Per Token
The unit economics of LLM APIs.
Related workflows
Turn this into a repeatable process.
- →How to Create a Website with AI
Go from idea to a live, custom-domain website in one afternoon using AI builders.
- →How to Build an AI Content System
A repeatable pipeline that turns one input into publish-ready content across every channel.
- →How to Start a Niche Website with AI
Pick a niche, validate demand, build the site, and publish ranking content using AI end-to-end.
- →Personal Research Assistant Workflow
A repeatable system to research any topic deeply in under 30 minutes.
Related tool stacks
The tools that run it in production.
- →AI Automation Operator Stack
The default toolset for one operator running multiple AI-powered business workflows.
- →AI Research & Knowledge Stack
Default toolset for analysts, founders and creators doing deep research with AI.
Comparisons & alternatives
Pick between the options.
- →Claude vs GPT vs Gemini
The three frontier model families, side by side.
- →OpenAI vs Anthropic for Agents
Which provider builds better production agents in 2026.
- →Groq vs Together AI
Fast open-model inference: throughput vs breadth.
- →Chroma vs Qdrant vs Pinecone
Open-source local vs managed cloud vector databases.