---
title: Providers And Presets
description: How to think about provider choice, local models, and presets without turning the docs into a provider catalog.
---

Use this page when you need to choose model providers, install the right extras, and decide whether presets or custom configs should be the starting point.

## Provider Coverage

| Type | Main options |
|---|---|
| Hosted providers | OpenAI, Anthropic, Groq, Together, Hugging Face |
| Local or self-hosted | Ollama, vLLM |
| Framework-mediated | Vercel AI SDK, LangChain integrations |

## Practical Guidance

- Start with the provider you already use in production.
- Add a second provider when you need cost, resilience, or model specialization.
- Use local or self-hosted providers when deployment control matters more than turnkey access.
- Use presets for speed, then move to custom configuration only when the workload demands it.

## Install Paths

- [/get-started/installation](/get-started/installation)
- [providers.md](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/docs/guides/providers.md)
- [presets.md](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/docs/guides/presets.md)
- [local-providers.md](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/docs/guides/local-providers.md)

## Important Examples

- [examples/multi_provider.py](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/examples/multi_provider.py)
- [examples/integrations/litellm_providers.py](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/examples/integrations/litellm_providers.py)
- [examples/multi_instance_ollama.py](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/examples/multi_instance_ollama.py)
- [examples/multi_instance_vllm.py](https://github.com/lemony-ai/cascadeflow/blob/main/examples/multi_instance_vllm.py)
