Meta delays release of flagship ‘Behemoth’ AI model as engineers struggle: report

Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta Platforms is delaying the release of its flagship “Behemoth” AI model due to concerns about its capabilities, the Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, citing people familiar with the matter.

Company engineers are struggling to significantly improve the capabilities of its Behemoth large-language model, resulting in staff questions about whether improvements over earlier versions are significant enough to justify public release, the report said.

Early in its development, Behemoth was internally scheduled for release in April to coincide with Meta’s inaugural AI conference for developers, but later pushed an internal target for the model’s launch to June, according to the report. It has now been delayed to fall or later, the report said.

Behemoth was internally scheduled for release in April to coincide with Meta’s inaugural AI conference for developers. It has now been delayed to fall or later, the report said. AP

The social media giant did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.

Meta had said in April it was previewing Llama 4 Behemoth, which it called “one of the smartest LLMs in the world and our most powerful yet to serve as a teacher for our new models.”

Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta had called the Behemoth large-language model “one of the smartest LLMs in the world.” AP

It released the latest version of its LLM Llama, called the Llama 4 Scout and Llama 4 Maverick, that month.