Can Pixtral 12B run on RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB?

YES — Runs Great

A79Great

Estimated from fit model

Pixtral 12B needs ~12.3 GB VRAM. RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB has 16.0 GB. With Q4_K_M quantization, expect ~63 tok/s.

Runtime: llama.cppCapacity: RoomyBandwidth: MediumStack: StandardBottleneck: Balanced

Operating mode

Choose the run profile you care about

Interactive favors responsiveness, while light API and scale-out lean harder on serving readiness. The fit stays the same, but the recommendation lens changes.

Current mode

Balanced

Balanced for general local use. Keeps the ranking neutral across personal and serving workflows.

Capabilities:

Select quantization to explore

Q4_K_M (Medium quality) — 12.3 GB, 71.1 tok/s, Runs well

12.3 GB required16.0 GB available

77% VRAM used

Fit status

Runs well

Decode

71.1 tok/s

TTFT

2725 ms

Safe context

41K

Memory

12.3 GB / 16.0 GB

Memory breakdown

Weights7.3 GB

KV Cache2.4 GB

Runtime0.9 GB

Headroom1.6 GB

See how fast it feels

See how fast it feelsPixtral 12B on RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB
1st promptCold start — includes initialization
>What is local AI inference?
Local AI inference means running an AI language model directly on your own hardware — your laptop, desktop, or server — instead of sending requests to a remote cloud API.

When you run inference locally the model weights are loaded into your GPU or unified memory. Each token you generate requires reading those weights from memory, so memory bandwidth is the main bottleneck for decode speed.

Key benefits of running locally:
  - Full privacy: your prompts never leave your machine
  - No per-token cost or rate limits
  - Works offline once the model is downloaded
  - Latency depends only on your hardware
2nd promptWarm — model ready, no init overhead
>How much VRAM do I need?
It depends on the model size and quantization level. A rough rule of thumb:

  Model size     Q4 (4-bit)    Q8 (8-bit)    FP16
  7B params      ~4.3 GB       ~7.5 GB       ~14 GB
  13B params     ~7.9 GB       ~13.9 GB      ~26 GB
  70B params     ~42.7 GB      ~74.9 GB      ~140 GB

Most people use 4-bit quantization (Q4_K_M) which gives 90-95% of full quality at a fraction of the memory. A 24 GB GPU can comfortably run most 7B-13B models.
Estimated: 71.1 tok/s decode · 2.7s TTFT (warm) · 178 tok/s prefill

What limits this setup

This setup is broadly balanced for this model.

No major red flags

This recommendation has enough memory headroom and acceptable estimated speed for the selected workload.

Best improvement path

Performance by workload

Workload	Grade	Fit	Decode	TTFT	Context
Chat	A	Runs well	71.1 tok/s	1486 ms	41K
Coding	A	Runs well	63.0 tok/s	3075 ms	41K
Agentic Coding	A	Tight fit	71.1 tok/s	3963 ms	41K
Reasoning	A	Runs well	71.1 tok/s	3220 ms	41K
RAG	A	Tight fit	71.1 tok/s	4954 ms	41K

Quantization options

How Pixtral 12B (12B params) fits at each quantization level on RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB (16.0 GB usable).

Quant	Bits	VRAM	Quality	Fit
Q2_K	2	4.7 GB	Low	A72
Q3_K_S	3	5.9 GB	Low	A73
NVFP4	4

Get started

Copy-paste commands to run Pixtral 12B on your machine.

Run

ollama run pixtral

Your hardware

More models your RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB can run

Model	Params	Grade	Decode	Capabilities
Qwen 3 14B	14B	S	66.7 tok/s
Phi-4-reasoning-plus 14B	14.7B	S	56.9 tok/s

Frequently asked questions

Can RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB run Pixtral 12B?

Yes, RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB can run Pixtral 12B with a A grade (Runs well). Expected decode speed: 63.0 tok/s.

How much VRAM does Pixtral 12B need?

Pixtral 12B (12B parameters) requires approximately 12.3 GB of memory with Q4_K_M quantization.

What is the best quantization for Pixtral 12B?

The recommended quantization for Pixtral 12B is Q4_K_M, which balances quality and memory efficiency.

What speed will Pixtral 12B run at on RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB?

On RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB, Pixtral 12B achieves approximately 63.0 tokens per second decode speed with a time-to-first-token of 3075ms using Q4_K_M quantization.

Can RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB run Pixtral 12B for coding?

For coding workloads, Pixtral 12B on RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB receives a A grade with 63.0 tok/s and 41K context.

What context window can Pixtral 12B use on RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB?

On RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB, Pixtral 12B can safely use up to 41K tokens of context. The model's official context limit is 131K, but available memory constrains the safe maximum.

See all results for RTX 4090 Laptop 16GB See all hardware for Pixtral 12B

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