AI from Goldfish Memory to Photographic Recall: The Killer Open-Source Tool https://github.com/run-llama/llama_index… This is LlamaIndex, the most mature RAG framework in the Python ecosystem, and a blockbuster open-source project with 49k+ stars! The biggest pain point for AI assistants is memory: they forget today’s questions tomorrow and require you to repeat last week’s strategies this week. You need an AI with true memory, not a goldfish. LlamaIndex solves this in one sentence: it vectorizes all your documents, conversations, notes, PDFs, and code, storing them in a database for precise recall via semantic search, moving beyond rigid keyword matching! // Core capabilities are maxed out: • Vector storage supporting virtually all formats, including PDF, Word, Markdown, Notion, and web pages • Semantic retrieval that understands when you ask about “that strategy from last time” • Persistent memory across sessions, surviving browser restarts and OS reinstalls • Supports dozens of vector databases like Chroma, Qdrant, Weaviate, and Pinecone, running smoothly even locally Using it in practice is a dimensional strike: throw in hundreds of pages of documents, and after indexing, ask any question. Within three seconds, it precisely extracts answers from massive history, with context so coherent you might suspect it has read all your chat logs. Fully open-source, Python-native, with the most complete community ecosystem, it’s the ultimate memory plugin for developers, AI Agent players, knowledge workers, and document enthusiasts! No more manually scrolling through history, copy-pasting, or re-explaining. From goldfish memory to photographic recall, this is the only framework you need. Once you use it, there’s no going back.

run-llama/llama_index

Source: https://github.com/run-llama/llama_index

🗂️ LlamaIndex 🦙

PyPI - Downloads (https://pypi.org/project/llama-index/) Build (https://github.com/run-llama/llama_index/actions/workflows/build_package.yml) GitHub contributors (https://github.com/jerryjliu/llama_index/graphs/contributors) Discord (https://discord.gg/dGcwcsnxhU) Twitter (https://x.com/llama_index) Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/LlamaIndex/) Ask AI (https://www.phorm.ai/query?projectId=c5863b56-6703-4a5d-87b6-7e6031bf16b6)

LlamaIndex OSS (by LlamaIndex (https://llamaindex.ai?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)) is an open-source framework for building agentic applications. Parse (https://cloud.llamaindex.ai?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–) is our enterprise platform for agentic OCR, parsing, extraction, indexing, and more. You can use LlamaParse with this framework or on its own; see LlamaParse below for signup and product links.

📚 Documentation:

• LlamaParse (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/cloud/llamaparse/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)
• LlamaIndex OSS (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/framework/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)
• LlamaAgents (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/llamaagents/overview/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)

Building with LlamaIndex typically involves working with LlamaIndex core and a chosen set of integrations (or plugins). There are two ways to start building with LlamaIndex in Python:

1. Starter: llama-index (https://pypi.org/project/llama-index/). A starter Python package that includes core LlamaIndex as well as a selection of integrations.

2. Customized: llama-index-core (https://pypi.org/project/llama-index-core/). Install core LlamaIndex and add your chosen LlamaIndex integration packages from LlamaHub (https://llamahub.ai/) that are required for your application. There are over 300 LlamaIndex integration packages that work seamlessly with the core, allowing you to build with your preferred LLM, embedding, and vector store providers.

The LlamaIndex Python library is namespaced such that import statements which include core imply that the core package is being used. In contrast, those statements without core imply that an integration package is being used.

``python

typical pattern

from llama_index.core.xxx import ClassABC # core submodule xxx from llama_index.xxx.yyy import ( SubclassABC, ) # integration yyy for submodule xxx

concrete example

from llama_index.core.llms import LLM from llama_index.llms.openai import OpenAI ``

LlamaParse (document agent platform)

LlamaParse is its own platform—focused on document agents and agentic OCR. It includes Parse (parsing), LlamaAgents (deployed document agents), Extract (structured extraction), and Index (ingest and RAG). You can use it with the LlamaIndex framework or standalone.

• Sign up for LlamaParse (https://cloud.llamaindex.ai?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–) — Create an account and get your API key.
• Parse — Agentic OCR and document parsing (130+ formats). Docs (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/cloud/llamaparse/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)
• Extract — Structured data extraction from documents. Docs (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/cloud/llamaextract/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)
• Index — Ingest, index, and RAG pipelines. Docs (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/cloud/llamacloud/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)
• Split — Split large documents into subcategories. Docs (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/cloud/split/getting_started/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)
• Agents — Build end-to-end document agents with Workflows and Agent Builder. Docs (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/llamaagents/overview/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)

Important Links

Documentation (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/framework/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)

X (formerly Twitter) (https://x.com/llama_index)

LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/llamaindex/)

Reddit (https://www.reddit.com/r/LlamaIndex/)

Discord (https://discord.gg/dGcwcsnxhU)

🚀 Overview

NOTE: This README is not updated as frequently as the documentation. Please check out the documentation above for the latest updates!

Context

• LLMs are a phenomenal piece of technology for knowledge generation and reasoning. They are pre-trained on large amounts of publicly available data.
• How do we best augment LLMs with our own private data?

We need a comprehensive toolkit to help perform this data augmentation for LLMs.

Proposed Solution

That’s where LlamaIndex comes in. LlamaIndex is a “data framework” to help you build LLM apps. It provides the following tools:

• Offers data connectors to ingest your existing data sources and data formats (APIs, PDFs, docs, SQL, etc.).
• Provides ways to structure your data (indices, graphs) so that this data can be easily used with LLMs.
• Provides an advanced retrieval/query interface over your data: Feed in any LLM input prompt, get back retrieved context and knowledge-augmented output.
• Allows easy integrations with your outer application framework (e.g. with LangChain, Flask, Docker, ChatGPT, or anything else).

LlamaIndex provides tools for both beginner users and advanced users. Our high-level API allows beginner users to use LlamaIndex to ingest and query their data in 5 lines of code. Our lower-level APIs allow advanced users to customize and extend any module (data connectors, indices, retrievers, query engines, reranking modules), to fit their needs.

💡 Contributing

Interested in contributing? Contributions to LlamaIndex core as well as contributing integrations that build on the core are both accepted and highly encouraged! See our Contribution Guide for more details.

New integrations should meaningfully integrate with existing LlamaIndex framework components. At the discretion of LlamaIndex maintainers, some integrations may be declined.

📄 Documentation

Full documentation can be found here (https://developers.llamaindex.ai/python/framework/?utm_medium=li_github&utm_source=github&utm_campaign=2026–)

Please check it out for the most up-to-date tutorials, how-to guides, references, and other resources!

💻 Example Usage

``sh

custom selection of integrations to work with core

pip install llama-index-core pip install llama-index-llms-openai pip install llama-index-llms-ollama pip install llama-index-embeddings-huggingface ``

Examples are in the docs/examples folder. Indices are in the indices folder (see list of indices below).

To build a simple vector store index using OpenAI:

``python import os

os.environ[“OPENAI_API_KEY”] = “YOUR_OPENAI_API_KEY”

from llama_index.core import VectorStoreIndex, SimpleDirectoryReader

documents = SimpleDirectoryReader(“YOUR_DATA_DIRECTORY”).load_data() index = VectorStoreIndex.from_documents(documents) ``

To build a simple vector store index using non-OpenAI LLMs, e.g. LLMs hosted through Ollama:

``python from llama_index.core import Settings, VectorStoreIndex, SimpleDirectoryReader from llama_index.embeddings.huggingface import HuggingFaceEmbedding from llama_index.llms.ollama import Ollama from transformers import AutoTokenizer

set the LLM

Settings.llm = Ollama( model=“llama-3.1:latest”, request_timeout=360.0, )

set tokenizer to match LLM

Settings.tokenizer = AutoTokenizer.from_pretrained( “meta-llama/Llama-3.1-8B-Instruct” )

set the embed model

Settings.embed_model = HuggingFaceEmbedding( model_name=“BAAI/bge-small-en-v1.5” )

documents = SimpleDirectoryReader(“YOUR_DATA_DIRECTORY”).load_data() index = VectorStoreIndex.from_documents( documents, ) ``

To query:

python query_engine = index.as_query_engine() query_engine.query("YOUR_QUESTION")

By default, data is stored in-memory. To persist to disk (under ./storage):

python index.storage_context.persist()

To reload from disk:

``python from llama_index.core import StorageContext, load_index_from_storage

rebuild storage context

storage_context = StorageContext.from_defaults(persist_dir=“./storage”)

load index

index = load_index_from_storage(storage_context) ``

A note on Verification of Build Assets

By default, llama-index-core includes a _static folder that contains the nltk and tiktoken cache that is included with the package installation. This ensures that you can easily run llama-index in environments with restrictive disk access permissions at runtime.

To verify that these files are safe and valid, we use the github attest-build-provenance action. This action will verify that the files in the _static folder are the same as the files in the llama-index-core/llama_index/core/_static folder.

To verify this, you can run the following script (pointing to your installed package):

``bash #!/bin/bash STATIC_DIR=“venv/lib/python3.13/site-packages/llama_index/core/_static” REPO=“run-llama/llama_index”

find “$STATIC_DIR” -type f | while read -r file; do echo “Verifying: file" gh attestation verify "file” -R “$REPO” || echo “Failed to verify: $file” done ``

📖 Citation

Reference to cite if you use LlamaIndex in a paper:

@software{Liu_LlamaIndex_2022, author = {Liu, Jerry}, doi = {10.5281/zenodo.1234}, month = {11}, title = {{LlamaIndex}}, url = {https://github.com/jerryjliu/llama_index}, year = {2022} }