Deploy Deep Search with DR-Tulu on Vast.ai
DR-Tulu is AI2's open-source research agent—an 8B model that autonomously plans research strategies, searches the web, reads pages, and synthesizes comprehensive answers with citations. Unlike typical LLMs with tools bolted on, DR-Tulu was trained end-to-end with its MCP tools, making it a compelling open alternative to proprietary research APIs. This guide walks through deploying DR-Tulu on Vast.ai, where you can run the full agent stack on affordable GPU instances and integrate it into your own agentic applications.
What Makes DR-Tulu Special?
Key features include:
- Native MCP Integration: Trained with web search and page reading tools from the start
- Autonomous Research: Plans strategies, gathers sources, and synthesizes cited answers
- Efficient Architecture: 8B parameters with strong research capabilities
What's in the New Guide
Our latest documentation walks you through deploying DR-Tulu on Vast.ai with a split architecture: vLLM for GPU inference on Vast.ai, MCP backend running locally for tool execution.
Complete Deployment Instructions
- Instance selection with the Vast.ai CLI
- vLLM configuration with the correct version (critical for compatibility)
- MCP backend setup with required API keys
- Workflow configuration to connect the components
Three Ways to Use DR-Tulu
- Interactive chat for exploratory research
- Batch evaluation against built-in datasets
- Python API for programmatic integration
Why This Architecture?
The split deployment keeps GPU-intensive inference on Vast.ai while running tool orchestration locally. This means:
- Your API keys (Serper, Jina) stay on your machine (or wherever you deploy the MCP backend)
- Model inference doesn't require sending data to third-party APIs
- You can modify the MCP backend without redeploying the model
- Lower Vast.ai costs since you only need GPU for inference
Who Should Use This Guide?
This deployment guide is perfect for:
- Researchers who need cited, source-backed answers at scale
- Developers building applications that require web research capabilities
- Teams evaluating open alternatives to proprietary research APIs
Get Started
The complete guide is now available in our documentation:
Read: Running DR-Tulu on Vast.ai →
Whether you're exploring agentic AI architectures or ready to deploy your own research assistant, this guide provides everything you need to get DR-Tulu running on Vast.ai infrastructure.
Ready to try it? Sign up for Vast.ai and follow the guide to deploy your first instance.
