Glossary/AI in Marketing/Small Language Model (SLM)
AI in Marketing
Small Language Model (SLM)
A compact language model that runs cheaply and quickly, sometimes on-device, for focused tasks where a large model is unnecessary.
By Brandon Mina·CEO, BrandPilot AI·Updated November 2026
Short answer
A small language model (SLM) is a compact language model designed to run cheaply and quickly, sometimes directly on a device. It is suited to focused tasks such as classification, summarization, or simple chat, where a large model would be unnecessary or too costly. SLMs often trade broad knowledge for efficiency and privacy.