Best LLM for Continue.dev
Continue lets you assign different models to different roles — autocomplete, chat, edit — so the best setup is usually a blend: a cheap fast model for completions and a stronger coding model for edits and chat.
Models Continue supports
Continue is an open-source VS Code and JetBrains assistant you configure with your own models — you can even mix providers, using a small fast model for autocomplete and a stronger one for chat and edits.
Best value pick
GLM-5.3-Flash
Z.ai (Zhipu AI) · Coding Arena 1607 · about $23.75/month at 100,000 calls. The top-ranked Kimi K3 costs $1,200.00/month — you save $1,176.25/month with GLM-5.3-Flash.
| 1 | GLM-5.3-Flash | 1607 | $23.75 | Z.ai (Zhipu AI) |
| 2 | Qwen3.8 27B | 1593 | $29.50 | Alibaba |
| 3 | DeepSeek V4 Flash | 1580 | $52.50 | DeepSeek |
| 4 | Hunyuan Hy3 | 1513 | $70.00 | Tencent |
| 5 | GPT-5.6 Luna | 1519 | $90.00 | OpenAI |
| 6 | GPT-5.6 Luna (India) (Bedrock)Est. | 1519 | $99.00 | AWS Bedrock |
| 7 | MiniMax-M3 | 1487 | $105.00 | MiniMax |
| 8 | DeepSeek V4 Pro | 1581 | $108.75 | DeepSeek |
| 9 | MiMo-V2.5-Pro | 1475 | $108.75 | Xiaomi |
| 10 | Qwen3.6 Plus | 1459 | $225.00 | Alibaba |
| 11 | Gemini 3.6 Flash | 1537 | $300.00 | |
| 12 | Gemini 3.7 Flash | 1587 | $300.00 |
Intelligence scores are community Arena ratings from LMArena / arena.ai, used under CC BY 4.0. Snapshot last refreshed 18 September 2026. Scores are a relative signal, not an absolute measure of capability. A Measured score was voted on directly; an Estimated score is inherited from an identical base model (a regional/creator-prefixed hosting duplicate). See our methodology.
Why picking isn’t obvious
Because Continue is bring-your-own-model and role-based, you're not locked into one choice: the value play is a fast, cheap model for high-frequency autocomplete and a higher coding-Arena model for the occasional hard edit. We rank the coding-capable models by Arena score and cost so you can slot each into the right role.
FAQ
What is the best value LLM for continue?
GLM-5.3-Flash is the cheapest model that still clears our quality bar for this task, at about $23.75/month for 100,000 calls (1,500 in / 500 out). It scores 1607 on the Coding Arena.
Is the most expensive model worth it for this?
Kimi K3 tops the Coding Arena but costs about $1,200.00/month here — roughly $1,176.25/month more than GLM-5.3-Flash for 72 extra Arena points. For most workloads that gap is not worth the premium.
Can I use different models for autocomplete and chat in Continue?
Yes — Continue configures models per role. A small, cheap, low-latency model is ideal for autocomplete, while a stronger coding model handles chat and multi-file edits. This split keeps cost down without hurting the hard tasks.
Does Continue cost anything itself?
The extension is open-source and free; you pay only for the models you connect via your own API keys (or run a local model for free). So the token price in the ranking below is effectively your whole cost.
Cite / link to this page
You’re welcome to reference this page and its figures with attribution and a link back.
https://aicalculatorpro.com/best-llm-for/continue-dev/<a href="https://aicalculatorpro.com/best-llm-for/continue-dev/">Best LLM for Continue.dev — AI Calculator Pro</a>