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Meta's Llama API competes with Microsoft ( MSFT ), Google, and

DeepSeek

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Meta's API available as limited preview, broader rollout

in

weeks to months

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Meta execs tout better customization compared with

competitors

By Kenrick Cai

SAN FRANCISCO, April 29 (Reuters) - Meta Platforms ( META )

on Tuesday announced an application programming

interface in a bid to woo businesses to more easily build AI

products using its Llama artificial-intelligence models.

Llama API, which was unveiled during the company's

first-ever AI developer conference, will help Meta go up against

APIs offered by rival model makers including Microsoft ( MSFT )

-backed OpenAI, Alphabet's Google and emerging

low-cost alternatives such as China's DeepSeek.

"You can now start using Llama with one line of code," chief

product officer Chris Cox said during a keynote speech onstage.

APIs allow software developers to customize and quickly

integrate a piece of technology into their own products. For

OpenAI, APIs constitute the firm's primary source of revenue.

Meta, which released the latest version of Llama earlier this

month, did not share any pricing details for the API. In a press

release, it said the new API was available as a limited preview

for select customers and would roll out broadly in weeks to

months.

The company also released a standalone AI assistant app earlier

on Tuesday. It plans to test a paid subscription service of its

AI chatbot in the second quarter, Reuters reported in February.

Meta releases its Llama models largely free-of-charge for

use by developers, a strategy CEO Mark Zuckerberg previously

stated will pay off in the form of innovative products, less

dependence on would-be competitors and greater engagement on the

company's core social networks.

"You have full agency over these custom models, you control

them in a way that's not possible with other offers," Manohar

Paluri, a vice president of AI, said at the conference.

"Whatever model you customize is yours to take wherever you

want, not locked on our servers."

DeepSeek, which has also released partly open-source AI models,

sparked a stock selloff in January amid concerns over the high

costs of AI development needed by top U.S. firms.

At the conference, Meta developers spoke about new

techniques they used to significantly reduce costs and improve

the efficiency of its newest Llama iteration. Zuckerberg

welcomed increased competition that would steer the competitive

ecosystem away from domination by a small number of leaders.

"If another model, like DeepSeek, is better at something,

then now as developers you have the ability to take the best

parts of the intelligence from the different models and produce

exactly what you need, which I think is going to be very

powerful," Zuckerberg said.