Use Groq when you want fast CI checks without incurring high API costs. Groq offers a free tier with no credit card required, making it a strong default for teams that want routine regression checks on every pull request without slowing builds down.
Groq is also the default judge provider that evalflow uses to score outputs — so even if you test against a different provider, Groq is already part of your eval pipeline unless you override the judge block.
Add a groq block under providers and set default_provider to groq:
providers:
groq:
api_key_env: "GROQ_API_KEY"
default_model: "llama-3.1-8b-instant"
eval:
default_provider: "groq"
api_key_env is the name of the environment variable that holds your key — evalflow reads the variable at runtime and never stores the key itself.
Set your API key
Get a free key at console.groq.com, then export it:
export GROQ_API_KEY="your-key-here"
Add this line to your shell profile (~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc, etc.) or a .env file so you do not have to re-export it each session. Never commit your .env file to version control.
Verify the connection
Run evalflow doctor to confirm evalflow can see the key before running any evals:
Run evals
evalflow eval --provider groq
Running test cases against llama-3.1-8b-instant...
Quality Gate: PASS
eval.default_provider is already set to groq in your evalflow.yaml, you can omit the --provider flag:
Provider notes
- Default model:
llama-3.1-8b-instant. This model is fast and well-suited for CI use cases where latency matters.
- Free tier: Groq’s free tier covers a generous number of tokens per day, enough for routine eval runs on most projects.
- Judge model: evalflow’s default judge is
llama-3.1-8b-instant on Groq. If you want a different judge, update the judge block in evalflow.yaml:
judge:
provider: "groq"
model: "llama-3.1-8b-instant"
Best for
- CI/CD pipelines where fast feedback loops matter
- Teams on a budget or without a billing account on other providers
- Default judge-model usage without additional configuration