Qwen 3 30B A3B needs ~31.2 GB VRAM. MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB has 69.1 GB. With Q4_K_M quantization, expect ~68 tok/s.
Operating mode
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.
Select quantization to explore
Fit status
Runs well
Decode
67.6 tok/s
TTFT
2863 ms
Safe context
131K
Memory
31.2 GB / 69.1 GB
This setup is broadly balanced for this model.
Shared-memory contention still exists
The OS, browser, and inference runtime all compete for the same physical memory pool, so real-world headroom is less forgiving than raw capacity suggests.
| Workload | Grade | Fit | Decode | TTFT | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chat | S | Runs well | 67.6 tok/s | 1562 ms | 131K |
| Coding | S | Runs well | 67.6 tok/s | 2863 ms | 131K |
| Agentic Coding | S | Runs well | 67.6 tok/s | 4165 ms | 131K |
| Reasoning | S | Runs well | 67.6 tok/s | 3384 ms | 131K |
| RAG | S | Runs well | 67.6 tok/s | 5206 ms | 131K |
How Qwen 3 30B A3B (30.5B params) fits at each quantization level on MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB (69.1 GB usable).
| Quant | Bits | VRAM | Quality | Fit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Q2_K | 2 | 11.9 GB | Low | A82 |
Q3_K_S | 3 | 14.9 GB | Low | A82 |
NVFP4 | 4 |
Copy-paste commands to run Qwen 3 30B A3B on your machine.
Run
ollama run qwen3:30b-a3bYour hardware
| Model | Params | Grade | Decode | Capabilities |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 Qwen 3.6 35B A3B | 35B | S | 56.8 tok/s | |
|
Yes, MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB can run Qwen 3 30B A3B with a S grade (Runs well). Expected decode speed: 67.6 tok/s.
Qwen 3 30B A3B (30.5B parameters) requires approximately 31.2 GB of memory with Q4_K_M quantization.
The recommended quantization for Qwen 3 30B A3B is Q4_K_M, which balances quality and memory efficiency.
On MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB, Qwen 3 30B A3B achieves approximately 67.6 tokens per second decode speed with a time-to-first-token of 2863ms using Q4_K_M quantization.
For coding workloads, Qwen 3 30B A3B on MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB receives a S grade with 67.6 tok/s and 131K context.
On MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB, Qwen 3 30B A3B can safely use up to 131K tokens of context. The model's official context limit is 131K, but available memory constrains the safe maximum.
Paste this snippet into any page to show a live fit card.
<iframe src="https://willitrunai.com/embed/qwen-3-30b-a3b-on-m4-max-96gb" width="400" height="180" frameborder="0" style="border:none;border-radius:12px;overflow:hidden;" title="Will It Run AI — fit result"></iframe>
Preview:
17.1 GB |
| Medium |
| A83 |
Q4_K_M | 4 | 18.6 GB | Medium | A83 |
Q5_K_M | 5 | 22.0 GB | High | A84 |
Q6_K | 6 | 25.0 GB | High | A85 |
Q8_0Best for your GPU | 8 | 32.6 GB | Very High | S86 |
F16 | 16 | 62.5 GB | Maximum | F0 |
| 35B |
| S |
| 61.8 tok/s |
| Qwen 3 32B | 32B | S | 39.5 tok/s |
Not always. MacBook Pro M4 Max 96GB can often fit larger models thanks to unified memory, but a discrete GPU with dedicated high-bandwidth VRAM may still decode faster once the model fits. For this combination, the important distinction is capacity versus sustained throughput.