Apple M3 Pro (18GB)
The Apple M3 Pro (18GB) has 18 GB VRAM and 150 GB/s memory bandwidth. It can run 35 of our 70 tracked models natively in VRAM at 8k context.
With 18 GB LPDDR5, the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) is a laptop-tier GPU that can run 35 models natively. It handles 30B-class models at Q4 quantization.
Apple M3 Pro (18GB): 18GB at 150 GB/s — base M3 Pro.
7B at Q4 native. 14B tight. ~6-10 t/s for 7B.
Same as 36GB.
| Vendor | Apple |
| Architecture | Apple M3 Pro |
| CPU cores | 12 (6P + 6E) |
| VRAM | 18 GB (unified) |
| Memory type | LPDDR5 |
| Memory bandwidth | 150 GB/s |
| Compute backend | METAL |
| Tier | Laptop |
| Released | 2023 |
| Models (native) | 35 / 70 |
| Models (offload) | 0 / 70 |
Software: MLX gives the best performance on Apple Silicon; llama.cpp Metal backend is a solid alternative. Both are well-supported by Ollama.
Popular models for this GPU
Models this GPU runs natively in VRAM (35)
- Qwen 3.5 35B-A3B (MoE)35B · MMLU-Pro 84.2Q2_K · ~167.2 t/s
- Qwen3 32B32.8B · MMLU-Pro 65.5Q2_K · ~13.9 t/s
- Nemotron 3 Nano 30B32B · MMLU-Pro 78.3Q2_K · ~167.2 t/s
- Qwen3 30B-A3B (MoE)30B · MMLU-Pro 61.5Q2_K · ~167.2 t/s
- Gemma 2 27B Instruct27.2B · MMLU-Pro 38.0Q2_K · ~16.8 t/s
- Gemma 3 27B Instruct27B · MMLU-Pro 67.5Q2_K · ~16.9 t/s
- Qwen 3.6 27B27B · MMLU-Pro 86.2Q2_K · ~16.9 t/s
- Gemma 4 26B (MoE)26B · MMLU-Pro 82.6Q2_K · ~132 t/s
- Mistral Small 3.1 24B Instruct24B · MMLU-Pro 66.8Q3_K_M · ~14.5 t/s
- Mistral Small 22B22.2B · MMLU-Pro 49.2Q3_K_M · ~15.7 t/s
- GPT-OSS 20B21B · MMLU-Pro 67.9Q4_K_M · ~73.3 t/s
- Qwen3 14B14.8B · MMLU-Pro 61.0Q5_K_M · ~15.7 t/s
- Qwen 2.5 14B Instruct14.7B · MMLU-Pro 63.7Q5_K_M · ~15.8 t/s
- Phi-4 14B Instruct14B · MMLU-Pro 70.4Q5_K_M · ~16.6 t/s
- Mistral Nemo 12B Instruct12.2B · MMLU-Pro 35.6Q6_K · ~15 t/s
- Gemma 3 12B Instruct12.2B · MMLU-Pro 60.6Q6_K · ~15 t/s
- Gemma 2 9B Instruct9.2B · MMLU-Pro 32.0Q8_0 · ~16.3 t/s
- Llama 3.1 8B Instruct8B · MMLU-Pro 48.3Q8_0 · ~18.8 t/s
- DeepSeek R1 Distill Llama 8B8B · MMLU-Pro 41.0Q8_0 · ~18.8 t/s
- Qwen3 8B8B · MMLU-Pro 56.7Q8_0 · ~18.8 t/s
- Qwen 2.5 7B Instruct7.6B · MMLU-Pro 56.3Q8_0 · ~19.7 t/s
- Mistral 7B Instruct v0.37.25B · MMLU-Pro 30.0Q8_0 · ~20.7 t/s
- Gemma 3 4B Instruct4B · MMLU-Pro 43.6BF16 · ~18.8 t/s
- Gemma 4 E4B4B · MMLU-Pro 69.4BF16 · ~18.8 t/s
- Phi-3.5 Mini Instruct3.8B · MMLU-Pro 47.4BF16 · ~19.7 t/s
- Llama 3.2 3B Instruct3.2B · MMLU-Pro 24.0BF16 · ~23.4 t/s
- Qwen 2.5 3B Instruct3.1B · MMLU-Pro 32.4BF16 · ~24.2 t/s
- Gemma 2 2B Instruct2.6B · MMLU-Pro 17.8FP32 · ~14.4 t/s
- Gemma 4 E2B2B · MMLU-Pro 60.0FP32 · ~18.8 t/s
- SmolLM2 1.7B Instruct1.7B · MMLU-Pro 19.0FP32 · ~22.1 t/s
- Qwen 2.5 1.5B Instruct1.5B · MMLU-Pro 16.8FP32 · ~25 t/s
- Llama 3.2 1B Instruct1.24B · MMLU-Pro 12.5FP32 · ~30.2 t/s
- Gemma 3 1B Instruct1B · MMLU-Pro 14.7FP32 · ~37.5 t/s
- Qwen 2.5 0.5B Instruct0.5B · MMLU-Pro 10.0FP32 · ~75 t/s
- SmolLM2 360M Instruct0.36B · MMLU-Pro 8.0FP32 · ~104.2 t/s
Too large for this GPU (35)
- Llama 3.3 70B Instruct
- Qwen 2.5 72B Instruct
- Qwen 2.5 32B Instruct
- Qwen 2.5 Coder 32B Instruct
- Mixtral 8x7B Instruct v0.1
- DeepSeek R1 Distill Llama 70B
- DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 32B
- Command-R 35B
- Yi 1.5 34B Chat
- Llama 3.1 70B Instruct
- Mixtral 8x22B Instruct v0.1
- Llama 3.1 405B Instruct
- DeepSeek V3 671B
- DeepSeek R1 671B
- Llama 4 Scout 109B
- Llama 4 Maverick 400B
- Qwen3 235B-A22B (MoE)
- MiniMax M1 456B
- GPT-OSS 120B
- GLM-4.5 355B
- GLM-4.5 Air 106B
- GLM-4.6 355B
- GLM-4.6V 106B
- GLM-4.7 358B
- Gemma 4 31B
- Qwen 3.5 122B-A10B (MoE)
- MiniMax M2.5 229B
- GLM-5 744B
- MiniMax M2.7 229B
- Nemotron 3 Super 120B
- Qwen 3.6 35B
- Kimi K2.6
- GLM-5.1 754B
- DeepSeek V4 Pro 1.6T
- DeepSeek V4 Flash 284B
Compare Apple M3 Pro (18GB) with other GPUs
Frequently asked questions
- How much VRAM does the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) have?
- The Apple M3 Pro (18GB) has 18 GB of LPDDR5 with 150 GB/s memory bandwidth (unified system memory, shared between CPU and GPU).
- What is the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) best for?
- With 18 GB of VRAM, the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) handles smaller models (7B–14B) at Q4–Q5 quantization — ideal for entry-level local LLM experimentation and lightweight inference.
- What LLMs can the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) run locally?
- The Apple M3 Pro (18GB) can run 35 of the 70 open-weight models tracked by CanItRun natively in VRAM at 8k context. Top options include: Llama 3.1 8B Instruct at Q8_0, Llama 3.2 3B Instruct at BF16, Llama 3.2 1B Instruct at FP32.
- Can the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) run Llama 3.3 70B Instruct?
- The Apple M3 Pro (18GB) does not have enough VRAM to run Llama 3.3 70B Instruct. You would need more VRAM or a lower quantization level.
- Can the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) run Qwen 3.6 27B?
- Yes. The Apple M3 Pro (18GB) runs Qwen 3.6 27B natively in VRAM at Q2_K quantization, achieving approximately 16.9 tokens per second.
- Can the Apple M3 Pro (18GB) run Llama 3.1 8B Instruct?
- Yes. The Apple M3 Pro (18GB) runs Llama 3.1 8B Instruct natively in VRAM at Q8_0 quantization, achieving approximately 18.8 tokens per second.