What can NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB run?
Build: RTX 3060 12GB + Ryzen 5 5600 + 32GB DDR4 (cheapest path)
Runs comfortably44 models
Full-VRAM resident, with room for context. No compromises.
Quant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 2.4 GBHeadroom: 9.6 GBTTFT: fast646tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q8_0Context: 8,192VRAM: 6.9 GBHeadroom: 5.1 GBTTFT: noticeableollama run llama3.2:3b73tok/sEstimated
ollama run llama3.2:3bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 3.6 GBHeadroom: 8.4 GBTTFT: fast228tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q5_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 7.9 GBHeadroom: 4.1 GBTTFT: noticeableollama run qwen2.5:7b49tok/sEstimated
ollama run qwen2.5:7bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 2.1 GBHeadroom: 9.9 GBTTFT: instant1435tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 2.0 GBHeadroom: 10.0 GBTTFT: instant2871tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q4_K_MContext: 2,048VRAM: 2.6 GBHeadroom: 9.4 GBTTFT: fast352tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 4.0 GBHeadroom: 8.0 GBTTFT: fast194tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q8_0Context: 8,192VRAM: 3.7 GBHeadroom: 8.3 GBTTFT: fastollama run llama3.2:1b220tok/sEstimated
ollama run llama3.2:1bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 4,096VRAM: 7.6 GBHeadroom: 4.4 GBTTFT: noticeable55tok/sEstimated
Quant: Q8_0Context: 8,192VRAM: 5.1 GBHeadroom: 6.9 GBTTFT: fastollama run gemma4:e2b110tok/sEstimated
ollama run gemma4:e2bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 4.6 GBHeadroom: 7.4 GBTTFT: fastollama run alibayram/kumru:latest161tok/sEstimated
ollama run alibayram/kumru:latestRuns with tradeoffs90 models
Tight VRAM, partial CPU offload, or context-limited.
Quant: Q5_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 8.9 GBHeadroom: 3.1 GBTTFT: noticeable- • Tight VRAM fit — only 3.1 GB headroom left for context growth
ollama run llama3.1:8b43tok/sEstimated
- • Tight VRAM fit — only 3.1 GB headroom left for context growth
ollama run llama3.1:8bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 2,048VRAM: 24.5 GBHeadroom: 6.7 GBTTFT: slow- • Partial CPU offload: ~51% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen3:30b1tok/sEstimated
- • Partial CPU offload: ~51% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen3:30bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 23.9 GBHeadroom: 7.3 GBTTFT: slow- • Partial CPU offload: ~50% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen2.5-coder:32b1tok/sEstimated
- • Partial CPU offload: ~50% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen2.5-coder:32bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 2,048VRAM: 25.8 GBHeadroom: 5.4 GBTTFT: slow- • Partial CPU offload: ~53% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen3:32b1tok/sEstimated
- • Partial CPU offload: ~53% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen3:32bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 2,048VRAM: 24.6 GBHeadroom: 6.6 GBTTFT: slow- • Partial CPU offload: ~51% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run gemma4:31b1tok/sEstimated
- • Partial CPU offload: ~51% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run gemma4:31bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 8,192VRAM: 10.8 GBHeadroom: 1.2 GBTTFT: noticeable- • Tight VRAM fit — only 1.2 GB headroom left for context growth
ollama run qwen3:8b48tok/sEstimated
- • Tight VRAM fit — only 1.2 GB headroom left for context growth
ollama run qwen3:8bQuant: Q4_K_MContext: 2,048VRAM: 25.8 GBHeadroom: 5.4 GBTTFT: slow- • Partial CPU offload: ~53% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run deepseek-r1:32b1tok/sEstimated
- • Partial CPU offload: ~53% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run deepseek-r1:32bQuant: Q8_0Context: 8,192VRAM: 24.6 GBHeadroom: 6.6 GBTTFT: slow- • Partial CPU offload: ~51% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen3:14b1tok/sEstimated
- • Partial CPU offload: ~51% of layers run on CPU
- • CPU is the bottleneck — upgrading RAM bandwidth helps more than VRAM here
ollama run qwen3:14bWhat if you upgraded?
Hypothetical scenarios. We re-ran the compatibility engine for each.
+32 GB system RAM
Check the current price
Adds 32 GB to your CPU-offload working set. Helps when models don't quite fit in VRAM.
Unlocks: 93 new tradeoff
- • Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
- • Qwen 3 30B-A3B
- • Llama 3.3 70B Instruct
- • Qwen 2.5 Coder 32B Instruct
Upgrade to NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 16GB (Mobile)
Check the current price
16 GB VRAM (vs your 12 GB) plus a bandwidth jump from ~360 GB/s to ~512 GB/s.
Unlocks: 44 new comfortable
- • Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
- • Qwen 3 8B
- • DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 7B
- • Hermes 3 Llama 3.1 8B
Add a second NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 12GB
Launch MSRP $329 (2021). Check the current price.
Tensor parallelism splits the model across both cards, effectively doubling VRAM. Bandwidth doesn't double — runs ~1.5× the single-card speed in practice.
Unlocks: 69 new comfortable
- • Llama 3.1 8B Instruct
- • Qwen 3 8B
- • Qwen 3 14B
- • Mistral Small 3 24B
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Won't runtop 5 popular models
Need more memory than you have. Shown for orientation.
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
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Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
—
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
—
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
—
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
—
Even with CPU offload, needs more memory than your VRAM (12 GB) + 60% of system RAM (19 GB) combined.
Not enough VRAM for these models? Rent a GPU by the hour
The models above need more memory than 12 GB VRAM + 32 GB system RAM. You can rent a GPU with enough VRAM by the hour to run one of them, or to test it before you buy hardware. For daily use, owning a card usually costs less over time.
RunPod
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The two tiers run on different hosts and terms. Check which tier a pod is on before a long job.
Rent on RunPodVast.ai
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Host quality varies. Filter for verified hosts and check the host's reliability before a long run.
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How to read these numbers
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