Kimi K3 goes open-source: Moonshot releases model weights with flexible licence

Chinese AI startup Moonshot AI has rattled U.S. Big Tech with the July launch of Kimi K3, a massive open model that is prompting renewed debate over America’s approach to open-source AI and competition.

Unveiled on July 16, 2026, Kimi K3 was billed as the “world’s first open 3T-class model”. It features 2.8 trillion parameters and a 1 million-token context window. For context, one of Google’s recent Gemma 4 open models has 30.7 billion parameters.

Moonshot itself said Kimi K3’s overall performance still “trails” frontier closed models like Anthropic’s Claude Fable 5 and OpenAI’s GPT-5.6 Sol. But the company claimed the model delivered frontier-level results across its evaluation suite.

The launch set off a wave of reaction online in the U.S., with calls to launch more open models, issue more visas, build more data centres, and encourage more domestic competition.

Momentum grew further on July 27, when Moonshot released the model weights for Kimi K3. The move allows developers to modify and run the model for commercial use under a far more flexible licence, drawing a second round of attention from researchers and startups.

The model was showcased at the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai on July 18, 2026, where the Kimi branding drew significant crowds.