NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 — Local LLM Performance & Compatibility

Written by Jakub Rusinowski · Last updated July 12, 2026

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)60–115 tok/s (estimated)
Inference Speed (Llama 3.3 70B Q4_K_M)Does not fit — needs ~44 GB of 24 GB usable
Buy This HardwareNVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 24GB — 24 GB VRAM · 350 W board powerDeploy in the Cloud NowRTX 3090 on RunPod — from $0.46/hr · rate checked 2026-08

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NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090 24GB
24 GB VRAM · 350 W board power
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 3.1 FamilyLlama 3.1 8B Instruct · 6 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run llama3.1
DeepSeek R1DeepSeek R1 Distill Qwen 32B · 20 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run deepseek-r1:32b
Qwen 3Qwen 3 32B · 21 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run qwen3:32b
Gemma 3Gemma 3 27B Instruct · 17 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run gemma3:27b
Mistral Small 3.1Mistral Small 3.1 24B · 15 GB VRAM · Q4_K_M · ollama run mistral-small3.1
Phi-4 FamilyPhi-4 (14B) · 9 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 is estimated to run Llama 3.1 8B at 60–115 tok/s with Q4_K_M quantization. Llama 3.3 70B does not fit: it needs about 44 GB against 24 GB usable. These are modelled estimates, not measurements — see /en/methodology.

What LLMs can I run on 24 GB VRAM?

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

Can I Run It? — NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090

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