Ollama and Local Models

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What it does

Ollama is a provider of the AgentsRoom catalogue: pick it on an agent and type the model you want to run, local or hosted on Ollama Cloud. By default the Ollama provider starts the Claude Code CLI on top of an Ollama model (ollama launch claude), so you keep a real coding agent, with tools and the AgentsRoom MCP, while the model runs on your machine or on your Ollama Cloud subscription. A second variant, Ollama - Chat, opens Ollama's bare chat instead. The same free-text model field exists for every catalogue provider, so any model id your CLI accepts can be launched without waiting for it to appear in a picker.

Where to find it

  • Provider picker of the Add agent / Edit agent dialogs: the Ollama card, with its variants listed under the name (Claude Code, Chat). Selecting the card shows a chip per variant.
  • Model field of the same dialogs: preset buttons from the catalogue plus a free-text field ("e.g. gemma3, qwen3-coder, glm-4.6:cloud").
  • Switch Provider window (pill in the terminal header) to move a running agent onto Ollama.

How to use it

  1. Install Ollama and, for the default variant, the Claude Code CLI as well (ollama launch claude starts Claude Code with an Ollama backend).
  2. Create or edit an agent, select the Ollama card, then the variant: Claude Code for a coding agent, Chat for the raw Ollama REPL.
  3. In Model, click a preset or type any id. No suffix means the model runs locally (gemma3, qwen3-coder); a :cloud suffix (glm-4.6:cloud, qwen3-coder:480b-cloud) runs it through your Ollama Cloud subscription after ollama signin. Hosting is encoded in the model id, there is no separate switch.
  4. Launch. The model you typed is substituted into the provider's launch command; the agent header shows the provider and model.

Other local backends: OpenCode can be configured with an OpenAI-compatible baseURL (LM Studio, Ollama, llama.cpp), and its model picker in AgentsRoom then lists the ids your OpenCode installation reports, including two-slash ids such as lmstudio/qwen/qwen3-coder-30b. oh-my-pi accepts any backend/model id typed by hand.

Settings

None specific. The provider tab in Settings > AI providers & accounts only adds launch flags; the model and the hosting are chosen on the agent.

Agent tools (MCP)

  • agents_save: create or update a saved agent with provider ollama (or the composite ollama:claude / ollama:chat) and a free model id.
  • settings_set with scope: "agent": change the model of an existing agent.

Providers

Ollama itself is provider-agnostic on the model side: any id ollama knows can be typed. The Claude Code variant inherits Claude's status detection (busy, needs input) because it really runs the claude binary; the Chat variant shows no such statuses. The free-text model field and the {model} substitution work for every catalogue-only provider, not only Ollama.

Mobile

Present for selection: the Add agent sheet and the Switch Provider sheet show the Ollama card with its variants and the model presets, and the choice is executed by the desktop. Typing a custom model id is a desktop-only field.

Limits

  • The default variant needs both ollama and claude installed; if Claude Code is missing, the agent fails on claude and the CLI-missing banner points at that binary.
  • No usage or quota meter for Ollama: the footer usage panel covers the CLIs that publish a quota.
  • The model list is curated in the catalogue and can lag behind Ollama's library; the free-text field is the intended path for anything newer.
  • An agent created before the variants existed keeps launching with the base command (Claude Code) until a variant is chosen on it.
  • Agents started from the phone use the model id as typed, with no correction against the catalogue.

Common questions

  • Does "Ollama" give me a coding agent or just a chat? Both, by variant. Ollama - Claude Code is Claude Code driving an Ollama model, with file edits, tools and the AgentsRoom MCP; Ollama - Chat is ollama run, a plain chat with no repository access.
  • How do I run a cloud model instead of a local one? Add :cloud to the model id, for example glm-4.6:cloud, after signing in with ollama signin. Without the suffix the model is pulled and run locally.
  • My Ollama agent says Claude is not found. The default variant launches Claude Code; install the Claude Code CLI, or switch the agent to the Chat variant.
  • Can I use a model that is not in the presets? Yes, type it in the model field. Anything ollama run <id> accepts works.
  • Is my code sent anywhere? With a local model, nothing leaves the machine. With a :cloud model, the conversation goes to Ollama Cloud under your own account.

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