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Open WebUI is a web-based, extensible AI interface that provides a unified GUI for interacting with local and cloud LLMs. It supports multiple LLM runners and OpenAI-compatible APIs, built-in RAG, artifact storage, and collaboration features.

Key Features

• Multi-runner support (Ollama and OpenAI-compatible endpoints) and built-in inference integrations for flexible model selection
• Local Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) with support for multiple vector databases and content extractors
• Image generation and editing integrations with local and remote engines; prompt-based editing workflows
• Granular role-based access control (RBAC), user groups, and enterprise provisioning (SCIM, LDAP/AD, SSO integrations)
• Persistent artifact/key-value storage for journals, leaderboards, and shared session data
• Progressive Web App (PWA) experience, responsive UI, and multi-device support
• Native Python function-calling tools (BYOF) and a web-based code editor for tool/workspace development
• Docker/Kubernetes deployment options, prebuilt image tags for CPU/GPU and Ollama bundles
• Production observability with OpenTelemetry traces, metrics and Redis-backed session management

Use Cases

• Teams wanting a central, auditable chat interface to query multiple LLMs and manage permissions
• Knowledge workers and developers using local RAG pipelines to query private document collections securely
• Experimentation and model comparison workflows combining multiple models, image tools, and custom functions

Limitations and Considerations

• Advanced features (model inference, heavy image generation) require external runners or GPU resources; performance depends on the chosen backend
• Some enterprise integrations and optional storage backends require additional configuration and credentials
• Desktop app is experimental; recommended production deployment paths are Docker, Docker Compose or Kubernetes

Open WebUI is positioned as a flexible interface layer for LLM workflows, emphasizing provider-agnostic integration, RAG, and enterprise features. It is suited for teams that need a full-featured, customizable web UI for local and cloud model workflows.