Apple M4 — Local LLM Performance & Compatibility

Up to 32 GB unified memory at 120 GB/s. Fits 7–8B models with room for larger context windows, and can run some 13–14B models at aggressive quantization. Ships in the MacBook Air, Mac mini, iMac, and iPad Pro.

Technical Specifications

VRAM32 GB unified memory
Memory Bandwidth120 GB/s
TDP22 W
ArchitectureARM, 3nm TSMC
Release Year2024
MSRP at Launch$999
Inference Speed (Llama 3.1 8B Q4_K_M)~38 tokens/sec

LLMs Compatible with 32 GB Unified Memory

All models below run comfortably in 32 GB unified memory with Q4_K_M quantization.

Llama 3.1 Family6 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run llama3.1
Llama 3.2 Family8 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run llama3.2-vision:11b
Qwen 320 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run qwen3:32b
Gemma 316 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run gemma3:27b
Phi-4 Mini2 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run phi4-mini
Mistral Family16 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run mistral-small
DeepSeek R120 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run deepseek-r1:32b
SmolLM21 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run smollm2:1.7b

Best Use Cases

Quick Start with Ollama

Install Ollama then run the recommended model for this GPU:

ollama run llama3.1:8b

FAQ

Can the Apple M4 run local LLMs?

Yes — the Apple M4 has 32 GB unified memory and runs Up to 32 GB unified memory at 120 GB/s. Fits 7–8B models with room for larger context windows, and can run some 13–14B m

How fast is the Apple M4 for AI inference?

The Apple M4 runs Llama 3.1 8B at ~38 tokens/sec with Q4_K_M quantization.

What LLMs can I run on 32 GB VRAM?

With 32 GB you can run: Llama 3.1 Family, Llama 3.2 Family, Qwen 3, Gemma 3, Phi-4 Mini. Use Ollama for the easiest setup: ollama run llama3.1:8b.

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