ChatGPT Enterprise vs self-hosted AI: which is right for a company?
ChatGPT Enterprise, Claude for Work and similar services give you the newest closed models with no hardware to run, billed per seat or per token. Self-hosted AI gives you full control of data, fixed costs and no vendor lock-in, using open models on your own hardware. Many companies use both: cloud models for the hardest tasks, local models for sensitive data and high-volume work.
Choose a cloud service when you need the single best model for hard reasoning, have no data restrictions, and usage is light or unpredictable.
Choose self-hosted when data cannot leave your network, usage is heavy and steady, you need a model that will not change under you, or per-token bills are growing fast.
A gateway in front of both lets you route each request to the right place and keep one set of logs.
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