AI ModelsOctober 1, 2026

Amazon releases a free, open rival to the Jev decision model

Strands Decider 2B picks one answer from a fixed list for AI agents and runs on a single graphics card. AWS’s own tests put it near the top of its size class; no outside test has compared it with Jev.

A decision model does not chat or write. It reads a question and a list of options, and picks one. TypeSafe AI launched Jev, a paid model of this kind, on September 15, and others have followed.

By Deep-Tech ResearcherMODELS FOR AGENTS

Published: October 1, 2026, 22:47 CEST
Reading time: 3 min
Evidence: 5 sources · 2 primary

This story was generated by AI systems under the editorial rules of Silicon AI News and checked against the sources it links. Found a mistake? Email editor@siliconainews.com. How we report

In brief

Strands Labs, a team at Amazon Web Services, released Strands Decider 2B on October 1, a small open-source model that makes choices for AI agents. It always picks one option from a fixed list and gives a confidence score, instead of writing text. The weights are on Hugging Face under the Apache 2.0 licence, and AWS says the code, training data and scripts are on GitHub.

New to this? Read it in simple words

Amazon released a small, free AI model that makes quick choices for AI agents.
It always picks one answer from a list, instead of writing text.
Anyone can download it and run it on their own computer.
Amazon says it is fast and accurate, but no outside test has checked this yet.

Words to know

Decision model: An AI model that only chooses between set options, rather than writing answers.
Open source: Shared publicly so anyone can use, study and change it.
Benchmark: A shared set of test tasks used to compare AI models.

How it works

Strands Decider is built on Alibaba’s small Qwen3.5-2B model with a light adapter. Its text-writing part is replaced by a “pointer” that scores each option, which adds just over one million parameters, VentureBeat reports.

Because it can only point at an option, it never returns an invalid answer. AWS suggests it for routing, choosing tools, triage, guardrails and yes-or-no checks.

AWS says it is not meant for coding, chat or summaries, and that it is weaker than reasoning models on complex problems.

Sources1 3 4

AGENT · QUESTION + OPTIONS→POINTER SCORES EACH OPTION→ONE VALID ANSWER + CONFIDENCE

ABOUT 115 MS ON AN RTX 3090 · AWS FIGURE · APACHE 2.0

HOW IT DECIDES 01

A list in, one answer out.

From AWS’s blog and model card. The speed figure is AWS’s own.

AWS’s own numbers

AWS says a typical decision takes about 115 milliseconds on an Nvidia RTX 3090 graphics card, and about 153 milliseconds on an M3 MacBook.

On the public tasks of JevBench, an outside benchmark, AWS reports a score of 72.3%. Its blog ranks the model third of 33 in its size class.

AWS ran these tests itself. Its chart does not include Jev, and a rival open model, Mapika’s decider-2b, scores about 76%, VentureBeat notes.

Sources1 2 3

The race behind it

Jev is offered only through TypeSafe AI’s paid service, and its weights are not public. Strands Decider can be downloaded and run on a company’s own machines.

AWS engineer Marc Brooker began the model as a home project after seeing Jev, TechCrunch reports, before AWS turned it into a release.

VentureBeat concludes that its edge is being open and reproducible, rather than beating rivals on scores.

Sources3 4 5

Sources

Every fact in this story comes from the sources below. Open them to check our work.

1
Primary source · October 1, 2026Introducing Strands Decider 2B: a small, open source, decision model Strands Agents (AWS)
2
Primary source · October 1, 2026StrandsAgents/strands-decider-2B-hobson-v19 (model card) Hugging Face
3
Research · October 1, 2026Amazon unveils a free, fast, open source Jev killer: Strands Decider 2B makes decisions in fractions of a second VentureBeat
4
Research · October 1, 2026Amazon releases its own Jev clone as decision models flood the web TechCrunch
5
Research · October 1, 2026AWS Releases Strands Decider 2B, a Small Model for an AI Agent’s Routine Decisions The Letter Two

How we checked this story

We read AWS’s blog and the model card, and compared VentureBeat, TechCrunch and The Letter Two. All speed and accuracy figures are AWS’s own; outlets give slightly different speeds and rankings, so we use the blog’s. No outside group has tested the model against Jev.

Story mapHOW IT DECIDES

How Strands Decider 2B connects

Decision Models
Strands Decider 2B an open model of the same kind , connected to Decision Models
Also in 3 other stories
Jev Launch
Strands Decider 2B built as an open alternative to Jev , connected to Jev Launch
Also in 1 other story
Open Models
Strands Decider 2B Apache 2.0 weights on Hugging Face , connected to Open Models
Also in 7 other stories

The story so far

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