Meta Reportedly Delays 'Behemoth' AI Model: What This Could Mean for Its AI Tools
Meta has reportedly pushed back the release of its Behemoth large language model for its artificial intelligence tools, delaying it until the fall. Behemoth was originally planned to release in April to coincide with Meta's first AI conference, LlamaCon, but was delayed until June before being delayed again now, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal on Thursday.
Meta released Llama 4 in April. Llama -- Large Language Model Meta AI -- is Meta's family of LLMs. But Meta AI engineers are concerned the capabilities in the Behemoth LLM aren't a significant enough improvement over what's already available via Llama 4 to warrant a release next month, according to WSJ citing unnamed sources within Meta.
A large language model is what sits behind the chatbot interface you interact with when you ask AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini and Meta AI a question. LLMs understand and generate human-like text.
Behemoth is "one of the smartest LLMs in the world and our most powerful yet to serve as a teacher for our new models," Meta said in April.
The tech giant aims to become one of the biggest AI providers, and has already woven AI into how you interact on many of its apps across Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp and Messenger, including helping with writing posts and captions, and editing your images. Meta also released a standalone app for Meta AI at the end of April, which includes a hub for its Ray-Ban smart glasses.
CNET social media and AI reporter Katelyn Chedraoui, who reported on LlamaCon in April, said this fresh delay adds to concerns that Meta is already behind the curve on what its AI tools are capable of.
"Meta's reported decision to delay the release of its new Llama models means the company could fall even further behind other big companies like OpenAI and Google," Chedraoui said. "The race to build advanced and affordable AI is extremely competitive. The concern for Meta is how far ahead competitors will advance while it's still working on refining the models it has already announced."
Meta didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
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