Mindbench.ai: an actionable platform to evaluate the profile and performance of large language models in a mental healthcare context

Individuals are increasingly utilizing large language model (LLM)-based tools for mental health guidance and crisis support in place of human experts. While AI technology has great potential to improve health outcomes, insufficient empirical evidence exists to suggest that AI technology can be deployed as a clinical replacement; thus, there is an urgent need to assess and regulate such tools. Regulatory efforts have been made and multiple evaluation frameworks have been proposed, however,field-wide assessment metrics have yet to be formally integrated. In this paper, we introduce a comprehensive online platform that aggregates evaluation approaches and serves as a dynamic online resource to simplify LLM and LLM-based tool assessment: MindBench.ai. At its core, MindBench.ai is designed to provide easily accessible/interpretable information for diverse stakeholders (patients, clinicians, developers, regulators, etc.). To create MindBench.ai, we built off our work developing MINDapps.org to support informed decision-making around smartphone app use for mental health, and expanded the technical MINDapps.org framework to encompass novel large language model (LLM) functionalities through benchmarking approaches. The MindBench.ai platform is designed as a partnership with the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) to provide assessment tools that systematically evaluate LLMs and LLM-based tools with objective and transparent criteria from a healthcare standpoint, assessing both profile (i.e. technical features, privacy protections, and conversational style) and performance characteristics (i.e. clinical reasoning skills). With infrastructure designed to scale through community and expert contributions, along with adapting to technological advances, this platform establishes a critical foundation for the dynamic, empirical evaluation of LLM-based mental health tools—transforming assessment into a living, continuously evolving resource rather than a static snapshot. AI chatbots powered by large language models are increasingly used for mental health support, yet they can give misleading or unsafe replies. To address this, our team created MindBench.ai, an open platform that helps patients, clinicians, researchers, and regulators evaluate AI systems transparently and consistently. Building on MINDapps.org, it profiles and benchmarks AI tools with metrics developed with NAMI, experts, and people with lived experience to ensure transparency, safety, and responsible use in mental health.