Why does AI give different answers or write bloated essays?
AI models frequently shift styles, suddenly outputting overly verbose essays or incorrect information instead of direct answers. This erratic behavior forces people to constantly rewrite responses, trim bloated code, and manually fix basic mistakes, which makes trusting the model for autonomous tasks impossible.
What the numbers show
Counted from the threads quoted below. How we count
- The most recent one is from September 2026.
- It is not one crowd: 2 people on Reddit and 1 on Hacker News ran into the same thing.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.
- 1Using different AI models for different tasks (e.g., Claude for work and Gemini for everyday life)Did this help you?
- 2Trimming down bloated code and fixing errors manuallyDid this help you?
- 3Using AI purely as a basic template or starting point rather than relying on it content-wiseDid this help you?
- 4Continuing to rely on traditional manual troubleshooting and searchingDid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“Yet, it will always make severely bloated and non-functioning playbooks where I basically have to trim it down 50% and change very easy mistakes it shouldn't have implemented in the first place.”source ↗
“The thought of it running autonomosly is giving me a headache, considering how many things needs manual intervention.”source ↗
“Coupled with the fact that LLMs still shoot out incorrect or blatantly false information.”source ↗
“I feel like Gemini has a split personality—sometimes it's a seasoned reasoning expert, and other times it just takes my words, expands on them, and writes a whole essay back to me.”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 3Employees demanding IT changes based on AI chatbot instructions
- 16How to push back against forced AI tools at work
- 7Where can I find real-world company AI policies and best practices?
- 5Why does my cat freeze and not respond to touch or sound?
- 12How to bypass customer service chat bots to talk to a human
- 2Why is AI billing so unpredictable and expensive?