Utility AI model (which model runs background AI features)

What it is

Omniscio uses a small, fast AI model in the background for dozens of minor tasks that don't need a full coding session: generating session titles, drafting suggestions, writing daily digests and weekly summaries, summarising articles and meetings, correcting text, and more. This background workhorse is the Utility AI model (sometimes called the cheap/utility model internally).

Where to find it

The global picker sits at Settings → Sessions → advanced → Utility AI model, where you pick any model from a list or leave it on Automatic. The same advanced panel carries a Per-feature AI models section, so a single feature can be pointed at its own model without changing the rest.

How it behaves

The automatic default — Luna, and DeepSeek when you have a key

Out of the box the Utility AI model is Luna (OpenAI's model served via OpenRouter), billed through Omniscio's own gateway. If you have added your own DeepSeek API key (Settings → Accounts & AI → API Keys → DeepSeek), Omniscio automatically routes all utility calls through your key instead — billed directly to your DeepSeek account at roughly half the cost. No toggle, no extra setup: the swap is silent and automatic the moment a valid key is present.

Global override

If you want to use a different model for ALL utility features — for example, a faster or cheaper alternative you have access to — set it in:

Settings → Sessions → advanced → Utility AI model

Pick any model from the list. Choosing Automatic (the default) restores the auto-DeepSeek-on-your-key / Luna behaviour described above.

Per-feature overrides

The same advanced panel shows a Per-feature AI models section where you can pick a different model for one specific feature without changing the rest. The features with individual pickers are:

Feature	Setting
Daily digest	dailyDigestModel
Weekly summary (Map + Verify steps)	weeklySummaryModel
Article reader	articleReaderModel
KMS / knowledge-vault summaries	kmsSummaryModel
Meeting summaries	meetingSummaryModel
Mind-map generation	mindmapModel
Supermail digest	supermailSummaryModel
Text correction	textCorrectionModel
Reply suggestions	replySuggestionModel
AI suggestions	aiSuggestionModel

Setting any per-feature picker to Automatic (its default) means "use whatever the global setting resolves to" — it inherits from the global override, or the auto-DeepSeek swap, or Luna.

Precedence, from highest to lowest

1. Per-feature explicit pick — a non-Automatic choice here wins everything.
2. Global override — a non-Automatic global setting wins for all features that haven't set their own pick.
3. Auto DeepSeek — fires automatically when the two above resolve to Automatic and you have a DeepSeek API key configured.
4. Luna — the company-funded fallback when nothing above applies.

What this does NOT affect

• Coding sessions — the model a session's Claude agent uses is set per-session (provider, model picker in the new-session bar). The Utility AI model only covers background, sub-second calls, not full interactive sessions.
• Weekly summary Reduce step — that step always runs on Opus 4.7 because synthesis quality matters there. Map and Verify follow the utility model setting.
• Ask Omniscio — the Ask panel has its own model selection.

For agents

Where it lives in code

• Resolution: resolveCheapUtilityModel / resolveCheapUtilityDeepseekSwap in src/main/services/llm-provider/provider-resolution.ts, wired in resolveChatCredentials (src/main/services/llm-provider-service.ts).
• Settings UI: PerFeatureModelsPanel.tsx and SessionBasicsSection.tsx inside src/renderer/src/features/settings/.
• Contract: .claude/memory/contracts/cheap-utility-model-contract.md.

Related

Who pays for a non-Claude coding session, and which company serves it, is on Who pays & who serves — a separate thing from this utility model — and the wider provider list is on AI providers. Your own keys, including the DeepSeek key that triggers the automatic swap, are managed on API keys, and a provider of your own is set up on Custom providers.