If a 270M Model Already Worked, Why Did I Fine-Tune a 7B One? (opens in new tab)

Over three posts I built three fine-tuned models for the same banking-intent task — , , . They all landed around the same accuracy. Which raises an honest, slightly uncomfortable question: if a 270M model on my laptop already worked, why reach for a 7B model at all? The answer most "bigger is better" content skips For this task — you wouldn't. A good engineer picks the smallest model that clears the bar, not the biggest one available. The small model is cheaper to serve, runs in milliseconds,...