diff --git a/CHANGELOG.md b/CHANGELOG.md
index 906fe08f2..0e6cd8e4a 100644
--- a/CHANGELOG.md
+++ b/CHANGELOG.md
@@ -6,6 +6,8 @@
 - fix: add json serialization support for neo4j sdk types
   [#699](https://github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/pull/699)
 - chore: update api-explorer to react 19 [#700](https://github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/pull/700)
+- chore: remove localHypermodeModels list and handle 404s properly instead in local dev
+  [#703](https://github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/pull/703)
 - fix: remove fallback to default time zone [#706](https://github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/pull/706)
 
 ## 2025-01-09 - CLI 0.16.6
diff --git a/runtime/models/hypermode.go b/runtime/models/hypermode.go
index bc7aab1bc..d33cf2204 100644
--- a/runtime/models/hypermode.go
+++ b/runtime/models/hypermode.go
@@ -27,9 +27,6 @@ func getHypermodeModelEndpointUrl(model *manifest.ModelInfo) (string, error) {
 	// In development, use the shared Hypermode model server.
 	// Note: Authentication via the Hypermode CLI is required.
 	if config.IsDevEnvironment() {
-		if _, ok := localHypermodeModels[strings.ToLower(model.SourceModel)]; !ok {
-			return "", fmt.Errorf("model %s is not available in the local dev environment", model.SourceModel)
-		}
 		endpoint := fmt.Sprintf("https://models.hypermode.host/%s", strings.ToLower(model.SourceModel))
 		return endpoint, nil
 	}
@@ -55,13 +52,3 @@ func authenticateHypermodeModelRequest(ctx context.Context, req *http.Request, c
 	// In production, the Hypermode infrastructure protects the model server.
 	return nil
 }
-
-// cSpell:disable
-// These are the Hypermode models that are available in the local dev environment.
-// This list may be updated as new models are added.
-var localHypermodeModels = map[string]bool{
-	"meta-llama/meta-llama-3.1-8b-instruct":                      true,
-	"sentence-transformers/all-minilm-l6-v2":                     true,
-	"antoinemc/distilbart-mnli-github-issues":                    true,
-	"distilbert/distilbert-base-uncased-finetuned-sst-2-english": true,
-}
diff --git a/runtime/models/models.go b/runtime/models/models.go
index ba577cfb7..a87e4d0ae 100644
--- a/runtime/models/models.go
+++ b/runtime/models/models.go
@@ -11,11 +11,13 @@ package models
 
 import (
 	"context"
+	"errors"
 	"fmt"
 	"net/http"
 	"strings"
 
 	"github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/lib/manifest"
+	"github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/runtime/config"
 	"github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/runtime/db"
 	"github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/runtime/httpclient"
 	"github.com/hypermodeinc/modus/runtime/manifestdata"
@@ -89,6 +91,13 @@ func PostToModelEndpoint[TResult any](ctx context.Context, model *manifest.Model
 	res, err := utils.PostHttp[TResult](ctx, url, payload, bs)
 	if err != nil {
 		var empty TResult
+		var httpe *utils.HttpError
+		if errors.As(err, &httpe) {
+			if config.IsDevEnvironment() && httpe.StatusCode == http.StatusNotFound {
+				return empty, fmt.Errorf("model %s is not available in the local dev environment", model.SourceModel)
+			}
+		}
+
 		return empty, err
 	}
 
diff --git a/runtime/utils/http.go b/runtime/utils/http.go
index b6f31c6f3..91c560a97 100644
--- a/runtime/utils/http.go
+++ b/runtime/utils/http.go
@@ -20,6 +20,15 @@ import (
 
 var httpClient = &http.Client{}
 
+type HttpError struct {
+	StatusCode int
+	Message    string
+}
+
+func (e *HttpError) Error() string {
+	return "HTTP error: " + e.Message
+}
+
 func HttpClient() *http.Client {
 	return httpClient
 }
@@ -38,9 +47,15 @@ func sendHttp(req *http.Request) ([]byte, error) {
 
 	if response.StatusCode != http.StatusOK {
 		if len(body) == 0 {
-			return nil, fmt.Errorf("HTTP error: %s", response.Status)
+			return nil, &HttpError{
+				StatusCode: response.StatusCode,
+				Message:    response.Status,
+			}
 		} else {
-			return nil, fmt.Errorf("HTTP error: %s\n%s", response.Status, body)
+			return nil, &HttpError{
+				StatusCode: response.StatusCode,
+				Message:    fmt.Sprintf("%s\n%s", response.Status, body),
+			}
 		}
 	}