Provider Optimization & Service Stability Update

Provider 2 Retirement:

Due to operational instability and the provider's bankruptcy, we have discontinued Provider 2. All affected models remain available through other providers with enhanced stability and reliability.

6 Models Removed from Provider 2:

• Ultra Tier: provider-2/claude-sonnet-4
• Basic Tier Models:
  • provider-2/qwen-3-coder
  • provider-2/kimi-k2-instruct
  • provider-2/gpt-4.1
  • provider-2/kimi-k2-instruct-0905
• Pro Tier: provider-2/gpt-5

Provider 6 (Inference.Net) Retirement:

Following concerning operational practices, Inference.Net was removed from both A4F and OpenRouter. Previously listed on OpenRouter's provider catalog, they have since been delisted due to partnership closure. All affected models remain accessible through more stable providers.

9 Models Removed from Provider 6:

• Free Tier Models:
  • provider-6/llama-3.2-1b-instruct
  • provider-6/mistral-nemo-12b-instruct
  • provider-6/llama-3.1-8b-instruct
  • provider-6/llama-3.2-3b-instruct
  • provider-6/llama-3.2-11b-instruct
  • provider-6/gemma-3-27b-instruct
  • provider-6/qwen2.5-7b-instruct
  • provider-6/qwen3-embedding-4b
  • provider-6/cliptagger-12b

Strategic Decision: Suspended all Claude Opus models due to significantly higher costs compared to Claude Sonnet 4.5, which demonstrates superior performance across critical benchmarks while being 5x more cost-efficient.

3 Models Suspended:

• Ultra Tier: provider-7/claude-opus-4-1-20250805, provider-7/claude-opus-4-20250514, provider-7/claude-3-opus-20240229

Performance Comparison - Claude Sonnet 4.5 vs Opus 4.1:

• Coding Excellence: Sonnet 4.5 achieves 77.2% on SWE-bench Verified vs Opus 4.1's 74.5%, with parallel compute reaching 82.0%
• Terminal Automation: Sonnet 4.5 scores 50.0% on Terminal-Bench vs Opus 4.1's 46.5%
• Computer Use Leadership: Sonnet 4.5 leads at 61.4% on OSWorld for real-world automation tasks
• Mathematical Reasoning: Sonnet 4.5 achieves 100% on AIME with Python execution
• Graduate-Level Reasoning: Sonnet 4.5 scores 83.4% on GPQA Diamond
• Cost Efficiency: Sonnet 4.5 is 5x cheaper at $3 input/$15 output per million tokens vs Opus 4.1's $15/$75

Recommended Alternative: provider-5/claude-sonnet-4.5 - Superior performance, significantly lower costs, available in Ultra tier

• Provider 5 Image Generation: Fixed provider-5/gemini-2.5-flash-image-preview for reliable image generation capabilities
• Duplicate Model Removal: Removed duplicate provider-1/deepseek-r1-0528 entry from Provider 1 catalog

Maintenance Window: Provider 1 will undergo infrastructure upgrades for approximately 6 hours to enhance performance and reliability. For complete details, see our Scheduled Maintenance announcement.

Compensation - Free Model Access Expansion: As appreciation for your patience during this maintenance, we're upgrading major Provider 1 models to Free tier access effective today or tomorrow. This provides broader access to flagship models across all subscription levels, ensuring everyone benefits from our enhanced infrastructure.

Impact: During the maintenance window, Provider 1 models will be temporarily unavailable. All other providers (3, 4, 5, 7) will continue operating normally with full model availability.

• Enhanced Stability: Provider consolidation eliminates unreliable infrastructure dependencies for improved uptime and consistent performance across all model endpoints
• Cost Optimization: Strategic model suspension and provider streamlining enables better resource allocation while maintaining superior AI capabilities through more efficient alternatives
• Multi-Provider Redundancy: All removed models remain accessible through alternative providers with enhanced reliability guarantees and performance SLAs

• No Service Disruption: All functionality remains available through alternative providers. Users of affected Provider 2 and Provider 6 models should update their integrations to the recommended alternatives listed above.
• Opus to Sonnet Migration: Users currently using Claude Opus models should migrate to provider-5/claude-sonnet-4.5 for superior performance and 5x cost reduction with identical or better results across all benchmarks.
• Provider 1 Availability: Please plan around the scheduled maintenance window. We recommend testing alternative providers during this period to ensure business continuity.
• Free Tier Expansion: The upcoming Free tier model access expansion demonstrates our commitment to democratizing AI access while maintaining service quality and sustainability.