diff --git a/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist.go b/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist.go
index 7b3d7d3a8..e92dc63c5 100644
--- a/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist.go
+++ b/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist.go
@@ -171,6 +171,7 @@ var LlamaCppAllowedFlags = map[string]bool{
 	"--chat-template-kwargs": true,
 	"--jinja":                true, "--no-jinja": true,
 	"--pooling":              true,
+	"--reasoning":            true,
 	"--reasoning-format":     true,
 	"--reasoning-budget":     true,
 	"--prefill-assistant":    true,
diff --git a/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist_test.go b/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist_test.go
index a73ec3890..3e22f3e92 100644
--- a/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist_test.go
+++ b/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_allowlist_test.go
@@ -161,6 +161,9 @@ func TestLlamaCppAllowedFlags_Categories(t *testing.T) {
 			"--embeddings", "--embedding", "--reranking", "--rerank",
 			"--metrics", "--no-metrics", "--jinja", "--no-jinja",
 		},
+		"reasoning": {
+			"--reasoning", "--reasoning-format", "--reasoning-budget",
+		},
 		"speculative": {
 			"--spec-draft-n-max", "--draft-n-max", "--draft-max", "--spec-draft-n-min", "--draft-n-min", "--draft-min",
 			"--spec-draft-p-min", "--draft-p-min",
diff --git a/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_test.go b/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_test.go
index 78fb84a39..d0fce6b4a 100644
--- a/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_test.go
+++ b/pkg/inference/runtime_flags_test.go
@@ -91,6 +91,13 @@ func TestValidateRuntimeFlags(t *testing.T) {
 			expectError: false,
 			description: "Sampling flags should be allowed",
 		},
+		{
+			name:        "llama.cpp: reasoning flag allowed",
+			backend:     "llama.cpp",
+			flags:       []string{"--reasoning", "off"},
+			expectError: false,
+			description: "Reasoning flag should be allowed",
+		},
 		{
 			name:    "llama.cpp: real-world flags from issue 515",
 			backend: "llama.cpp",