Ministral 3B — VRAM, speed & local setup
Written by Jakub Rusinowski · Last updated
Ultra-lightweight Mistral model for phones and edge devices. 2 GB VRAM required — even runs on integrated graphics.
Ministral 3B needs about 3 GB of VRAM at Q4_K_M — quantized weights plus framework overhead, before any KV cache. On Apple Silicon that figure comes out of unified memory.
VRAM and speed by quantization
Quoted against NVIDIA RTX 4090 (24 GB). Weights plus overhead only: this model's architecture is unpublished, so no KV cache is added.
| Quant | Memory | VRAM | Speed (est.) | Fit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Q2_K 2.63 bpw | 2 GB | ~228 tok/s | Fits | |
| Q3_K_M 3.41 bpw | 2.3 GB | ~206 tok/s | Fits | |
| Q4_K_M 4.83 bpw | 3 GB | ~176 tok/s | Fits | |
| Q5_K_M 5.67 bpw | 3.4 GB | ~161 tok/s | Fits | |
| Q6_K 6.56 bpw | 3.8 GB | ~149 tok/s | Fits | |
| Q8_0 8.50 bpw | 4.6 GB | ~127 tok/s | Fits | |
| F16 16.00 bpw | 8 GB | ~81 tok/s | Fits |
Black marker = usable memory on the NVIDIA RTX 4090 (24 GB). Estimates from the memory-bandwidth roofline on the methodology page. Ministral 3B VRAM calculator →
Get Ministral 3B running
The cheapest catalogued GPU that runs Ministral 3B is the Intel Arc B570 (10 GB).
or compare on Vast.ai from $0.35/hr (typical low · varies)
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How to run Ministral 3B
Install Ollama, then run:
ollama run ministral:3bSpecifications
Curated — A hand-written entry from before this catalogue recorded its sources. The figures are long-standing but their provenance is not on file.
- Parameters
- 3 Billion
- Context window
- 32,768
- Architecture
- Dense, Decoder-only
- Provider
- Mistral AI
- Licence
- Mistral Research
- Practical deployment
- Edge device (phone, SBC)
- Specified at
- Q4_K_M
- System RAM
- 8 GB
- Record updated
- 2024-10-16
Research / non-commercial only — this licence does NOT permit shipping a commercial product.
Quality and use cases
Scores as published by the model’s authors or an independent evaluator — quality, not throughput, and not measured by us.
Can I run Ministral 3B on my GPU?
- Ministral 3B on AMD Radeon RX 9060 XT 8GB
- Ministral 3B on Intel Arc B570
- Ministral 3B on Intel Arc B580
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 (12GB)
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3080 (10GB)
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Super
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Ti
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5060 Ti 8GB
- Ministral 3B on NVIDIA GeForce RTX 5070
Other Ministral sizes
Ministral 3B — frequently asked questions
How much VRAM does Ministral 3B need?
About 3 GB at Q4_K_M — quantized weights plus framework overhead, before any KV cache. The cache grows with context length and is added on top; the table above folds it in. Apple Silicon counts unified memory toward the same figure.
Does Ministral 3B run on an RTX 4090 (24 GB)?
Yes. Ministral 3B needs about 3 GB at Q4_K_M, inside a 24 GB card, at an estimated 176 tokens/sec.
How do I run Ministral 3B locally?
Install Ollama and run `ollama run ministral:3b`. That pulls the weights and starts a local OpenAI-compatible endpoint; after the download nothing leaves the machine.
What other sizes does Ministral come in?
Ministral 3B (3 GB), Ministral 8B (6 GB). Every size shares the family's training and licence; the larger ones score higher and need proportionally more memory.