NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 — Local LLM Performance & Compatibility

Still excellent for AI. 24 GB VRAM on par with RTX 4090 for model compatibility. Available used for $400–600. Slightly slower but fantastic value.

Technical Specifications

VRAM24 GB
Memory Bandwidth936 GB/s
TDP350 W
ArchitectureAmpere GA102
Release Year2020
MSRP at Launch$1,499
Inference Speed (Llama 3.1 8B Q4_K_M)~115 tokens/sec
Inference Speed (Llama 3.3 70B Q4_K_M)~22 tokens/sec
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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 24GB
Launch MSRP: $1,499
2026 prices are volatile — check the current listing.
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LLMs Compatible with 24 GB VRAM

All models below run comfortably in 24 GB VRAM with Q4_K_M quantization.

Llama 3.343 GB VRAM (smallest variant — needs more VRAM or a lower quant) · Q2_K_XS (Tight) · ollama run llama3.3
Llama 3.1 Family6 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run llama3.1
DeepSeek R120 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run deepseek-r1:32b
Qwen 320 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run qwen3:32b
Gemma 317 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run gemma3:27b
Mistral Small 3.114 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run mistral-small3.1
Phi-4 Family9 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run phi4

Best Use Cases

Quick Start with Ollama

Install Ollama then run the recommended model for this GPU:

ollama run deepseek-r1:32b

FAQ

Can the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 run local LLMs?

Yes — the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 has 24 GB VRAM and runs Still excellent for AI. 24 GB VRAM on par with RTX 4090 for model compatibility. Available used for $400–600. Slightly s

How fast is the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 for AI inference?

The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 runs Llama 3.1 8B at ~115 tokens/sec with Q4_K_M quantization. For the 70B model it achieves ~22 tokens/sec.

What LLMs can I run on 24 GB VRAM?

With 24 GB you can run: Llama 3.3, Llama 3.1 Family, DeepSeek R1, Qwen 3, Gemma 3. Use Ollama for the easiest setup: ollama run deepseek-r1:32b.

Can I Run It? — NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090

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