NVIDIA
Operating mode
Use this to bias workload recommendations toward responsiveness, background autonomy, lighter serving, or multi-GPU scale-out.
Current mode
Balanced
Balanced for general local use. Keeps the ranking neutral across personal and serving workflows.
The RTX 3090 Ti 24GB is the fastest Ampere consumer GPU ever made, pushing 1008 GB/s bandwidth and 80 TFLOPS FP16. It has the same 24 GB VRAM as the RTX 3090 but with meaningfully better bandwidth and compute. For local AI, the extra performance over the 3090 is real — faster decode on large models fits the workload better. However, at 450W TDP (the highest of any consumer GPU), it demands serious power infrastructure. It was extremely expensive at launch; only worth it used at a substantial discount over the 3090.
Beyond LLMs
What AI tasks this GPU can handle — from text generation to image and video creation.
| Capability | Status | Representative Model |
|---|---|---|
| LLM Chat (7B) | Runs natively | Llama 3.1 8B Q4 |
| LLM Coding (30B) | Runs natively | Qwen 3 30B Q4 |
| LLM Large (70B) | Won’t fit | Llama 3.1 70B Q4 |
| Image Gen (SDXL) | Runs natively | SDXL 1.0 FP16 |
| Image Gen (Flux) | Runs with offload | Flux.1 Dev FP16 |
| Image Gen (SD 3.5) | Runs natively | SD 3.5 Large FP16 |
| Video Short (25f) | Runs natively | LTX Video 2B |
| Video Long (100f) | Won't fit | Wan Video 14B |
Architecture
Ampere is NVIDIA's second-generation RTX architecture, built on Samsung's 8nm process. It introduced 3rd-generation Tensor Cores with support for sparsity-accelerated INT8 operations and improved FP16 throughput over Turing.
AI Relevance
Sparsity-aware Tensor Cores can effectively double throughput for structured sparse workloads. However, the lack of FP8 support means quantized inference is less efficient than Ada Lovelace or Blackwell.
Buying advice
Excellent choice for local AI
Runs 25 of 50 top models well — a strong all-rounder for local inference.
24.0 GB
VRAM
$1,999
MSRP
$83/GB
Cost per GB VRAM
Best models for this GPU
What will limit you first
This setup is broadly balanced for this model.
Very little memory headroom
You can run the model, but there is not much room left for longer context, bigger batches, extra apps, or future model updates.
Best upgrade itinerary
Buy headroom, not only minimum fit
A slightly larger memory tier gives you safer context growth and makes the recommendation more future-proof.
Unlocks 1 additional models that do not fit on the current setup.
Want more headroom? MacBook Pro M4 Max 36GB (36.0 GB unified memory) is the next step up.
Cost vs cloud API
Assumes 4 hours/day of active inference at 71 tok/s, RTX 3090 Ti 24GB amortized over 36 months, US residential electricity ($0.15/kWh), blended cloud pricing at $10 per 1M tokens (GPT-4o / Claude Sonnet tier).
30.8M
Tokens/month at this pace
$33.1
Monthly local cost
$308
Same tokens on cloud API
$1.07
Local $/1M tokens
Break-even: pays for itself in 3.0 months vs cloud API at this workload. Price reference: $900 (used market).
Chat
SQwen 3 14B matches Chat and keeps a practical fit profile. It is a recent-generation family, which helps on current local SOTA workloads. It fits natively with comfortable headroom. Context coverage stays within the requested workload envelope. Known distribution channels: huggingface, ollama, lm-studio.
Coding
SCodestral 2 25.08 is a specialized fit for Coding. It is a recent-generation family, which helps on current local SOTA workloads. It fits natively with comfortable headroom. Context coverage stays within the requested workload envelope. Known distribution channels: huggingface, lm-studio.
Agentic Coding
SQwen 3.6 27B is a specialized fit for Agentic Coding. It is a recent-generation family, which helps on current local SOTA workloads. It should run, but memory headroom will be limited. Context coverage stays within the requested workload envelope. Known distribution channels: huggingface, lm-studio.
Reasoning
SQwen 3 14B matches Reasoning and keeps a practical fit profile. It is a recent-generation family, which helps on current local SOTA workloads. It fits natively with comfortable headroom. Context coverage stays within the requested workload envelope. Known distribution channels: huggingface, ollama, lm-studio.
RAG
AGranite 4.1 8B matches RAG and keeps a practical fit profile. It sits in the middle of the current generation mix. It fits natively with comfortable headroom. Context coverage stays within the requested workload envelope. Known distribution channels: huggingface, ollama.
Qwen3-Coder 30B A3B InstructQwen3-VL 30B A3B Instruct
GPT-OSS 20BQwen 3 14B
Phi-4-reasoning-plus 14BQwen 3 30B A3BQwen 3.5 9BQwen 3.5 27B
Magistral Small 2507Devstral Small 2 24B InstructQwen 3.6 27BNemotron Cascade 2 30B A3BQwen 3 8BDevstral Small 1.1Ministral 3 14BNemotron 3 Nano 30BQwen 3.5 4BNemotron Nano 8BQwen 3.5 35B A3BPhi-4 Mini Reasoning 4BQwen 3 32BQwen 3.6 35B A3B
Jina Embeddings v3
BGE M3
EXAONE 4.0 32BQwen 3.5 397B A17BDevstral 2 123B Instruct
Kimi K2.5Kimi K2.6
DeepSeek V4 ProQwen 3.5 122B A10BDeepSeek V4 FlashMistral Small 4 119B
Command A 111BQwen 2.5 VL 72BGPT-OSS 120B
GLM-5.2Qwen3-Coder-NextGLM-5.1Pixtral Large 124BGLM-5DeepSeek V3.2Qwen 3 235B A22BQwen3-Coder 480B A35B Instruct
Gemma 4 31BLeanstral 119B A6BDeepSeek Coder V2 236BDeepSeek R1 671BDeepSeek V3.1 671BJust out of reach
High-quality models that need a bit more memory
Image & Video Generation
41 of 56 models can generate images or video on your RTX 3090 Ti 24GB
| Model | Max Resolution | Gen Time | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|
| SD TurboImage | 512×512 | 500ms | S |
| Stable Diffusion 1.5Image | 512×768 | ~1.1s | S |
| Realistic Vision v5.1Image | 512×768 | ~1.1s | S |
| DreamShaper 8Image | 512×768 | ~1.1s | S |
| LCM DreamShaper v7Image | 512×768 | 300ms | S |
| PixArt-SigmaImage | 1024×1024 | ~4.4s | S |
| FramePack I2VVideo | 256×256 | ~8.1s/frame | S |
| SDXL TurboImage | 512×512 | 500ms | S |
| SDXL LightningImage | 1024×1024 | ~1.6s | S |
| Stable Diffusion XL 1.0Image | 1024×1024 | ~4.4s | S |
| Playground v2.5Image | 1024×1024 | ~6.6s | S |
| RealVisXL v5.0Image | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| DreamShaper XLImage | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| Juggernaut XL v9Image | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| Animagine XL 3.1Image | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| Pony Diffusion V6 XLImage | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| Animagine XL 4.0Image | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| Illustrious XLImage | 1024×1024 | ~4.9s | S |
| Wan Video 2.1 1.3BVideo | 256×256 | ~3.2s/frame | S |
| Stable Diffusion 3.5 MediumImage | 1024×1024 | ~7.7s | S |
| Flux.2 Klein 4BImage | 1024×1024 | ~1.3s | S |
| LTX Video 2BVideo | 768×512 | ~3.8s/frame | S |
| KolorsImage | 1024×1024 | ~8.8s | S |
| Stable CascadeImage | 1024×1024 | ~11s | S |
| AuraFlow v0.3Image | 1536×1536 | ~19.7s | S |
| Stable Diffusion 3.5 LargeImage | 1024×1024 | ~24.1s | S |
| Stable Diffusion 3.5 Large TurboImage | 1024×1024 | ~4.4s | S |
| CogVideoX 2BVideo | 720×480 | ~3.8s/frame | A |
| HunyuanVideoVideo | 256×256 | ~8.1s/frame | A |
| ChromaImage | 256×256 | ~8.1s | A |
| Z-Image TurboImage | 1536×1536 | ~4.5s | B |
| Flux.1 DevImage | 256×256 | ~19.7s | B |
| Flux.1 SchnellImage | 256×256 | ~3.8s | B |
| LTX Video 13BVideo | 256×256 | ~8.1s/frame | B |
| Flux.1 Kontext DevImage | 256×256 | ~21.9s | B |
| AnimateDiff v1.5.3Video | 512×768 | ~2s/frame | B |
| Cosmos Diffusion 7BVideo | 256×256 | ~12.1s/frame | B |
| CogVideoX 5BVideo | 256×256 | ~11.5s/frame | B |
| Wan2.2 TI2V 5BVideo | 256×256 | ~11.5s/frame | B |
| Flux.2 Klein 9BImage | 256×256 | ~4s | D |
| Flux.1 Fill DevImage | 256×256 | ~18.7s | D |
| Krea 2Image | 256×256 | ~6s | F |
| Sulphur 2Video | 256×256 | ~7s/frame | F |
| Ideogram 4Image | 256×256 | ~9.8s | F |
| Mochi 1 PreviewVideo | 256×256 | ~7.3s/frame | F |
| HunyuanVideo 1.5Video | 256×256 | ~6.7s/frame | F |
| Helios 14BVideo | 256×256 | ~8.3s/frame | F |
| SkyReels V2 14BVideo | 256×256 | ~8.3s/frame | F |
| Wan Video 2.1 14BVideo | 256×256 | ~8.3s/frame | F |
| Wan Video 2.2 14BVideo | 256×256 | ~8.3s/frame | F |
| Qwen ImageImage | 256×256 | ~7.4s | F |
| Qwen Image EditImage | 256×256 | ~7.4s | F |
| LTX-2 22BVideo | 256×256 | ~9.9s/frame | F |
| Flux.2 DevImage | 256×256 | ~3m 28s | F |
| MAGI-1Video | 256×256 | ~10.3s/frame | F |
| HunyuanImage 3.0Image | 256×256 | ~13s | F |
Image models estimated at 1024×1024 (28 steps, FP16). Video models estimated at 768×512 (25 frames, 30 steps, FP16). Actual performance varies with runtime and system load.
Multi-GPU scaling
Scale out with multiple GPUs for larger models. PCIe interconnect with 30% scaling overhead.
| Config | Effective memory | Models that fit | Est. bandwidth |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1× RTX | 24 GB | 324/380 | 1,008 GB/s |
| 2× RTX | 48 GB | 343/380 | 1,411 GB/s |
Model counts use default quantization at coding workload settings. Multi-GPU scaling factor: 0.7× per additional GPU.
Upgrade paths
See what you unlock with more powerful hardware
Upgrade options
2× RTX 3090 Ti 24GBMulti-GPUUnlocks 19 additional models that do not fit on the current setup.
Scale-out only pays off if the host platform has enough PCIe lanes, slot spacing, power, and cooling.
The bigger the setup gets, the more the runtime matters. Multi-GPU and multi-user serving are where vLLM, SGLang, TGI, TensorRT-LLM, or tuned llama.cpp start to earn their complexity.
~$1,999 MSRP
Unlocks 1 additional models that do not fit on the current setup.
~$2,499 MSRP
RTX 5000 Ada 32GBNVIDIA upgradeUnlocks 6 additional models that do not fit on the current setup.
~$4,000 MSRP
Unlocks 17 additional models that do not fit on the current setup.
~$1,099 MSRP
Unlocks 45 additional models that do not fit on the current setup.
Lifts average decode speed across fitting models by about 159%.
~$8,000 MSRP
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB (24 GB VRAM) can run these top models: Qwen3-Coder 30B A3B Instruct (score: 96/100), Qwen3-VL 30B A3B Instruct (score: 96/100), GPT-OSS 20B (score: 95/100). See the full compatibility list above.
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB has 24 GB of VRAM available for AI model inference. This determines which models and quantization levels you can run locally.
Yes, RTX 3090 Ti 24GB is excellent for running LLMs locally with top compatibility scores above 80/100.
For coding on RTX 3090 Ti 24GB, we recommend Codestral 2 25.08. It achieves 51.2 tokens per second with 48K context window. Codestral 2 25.08 is a specialized fit for Coding. It is a recent-generation family, which helps on current local SOTA workloads. It fits natively with comfortable headroom. Context coverage stays within the requested workload envelope. Known distribution channels: huggingface, lm-studio.
There are 5 upgrade path(s) from RTX 3090 Ti 24GB: RTX 3090 Ti 24GB, MacBook Pro M4 Max 36GB. Upgrading would unlock larger models and faster inference speeds.
Yes, RTX 3090 Ti 24GB with 24 GB of usable memory can run Flux.1 Dev at FP16 natively. Flux is a 12B parameter diffusion transformer that produces high-quality images. You can also run the Schnell variant for faster generation.
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB (24 GB VRAM) can handle various AI generation tasks beyond LLMs. For image generation, SDXL and Stable Diffusion 3.5 run well. Flux.1 Dev also runs natively for state-of-the-art image quality. For video, LTX Video 2.3 can generate short clips. Check the AI Capability Matrix above for detailed compatibility.
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB is excellent for AI image generation. With 24 GB of usable memory, it runs all major diffusion models including Flux.1, SDXL, and Stable Diffusion 3.5 at full precision. You can generate high-resolution images quickly and even handle video generation models.
Yes, RTX 3090 Ti 24GB with 24 GB of usable memory can run Qwen 3.5 27B at Q4_K_M (~16.5 GB) with ~7 GB headroom for context and runtime. Quality at Q4 is very close to full precision for most tasks. Run it with: ollama run qwen3.5:27b
With 24 GB on RTX 3090 Ti 24GB, Q4_K_M is the sweet spot for 27B-35B models, Q6_K for 14B models, and Q8_0 for 8B-9B models. The general rule: use the highest quantization that fits with at least 2-3 GB headroom for KV cache and runtime.
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB already has strong memory bandwidth, so the next limit is often memory capacity and context headroom rather than raw decode speed. For local LLMs, fit first and bandwidth second is the right mental model.
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB supports up to 2× GPU scaling via PCIe. With 2× GPUs, you get 48 GB effective memory with a 0.7× scaling factor per GPU. This enables running models like Qwen 3.5 397B A17B and Devstral 2 123B Instruct that don't fit on a single card.
RTX 3090 Ti 24GB uses PCIe for multi-GPU communication, which has approximately 30% scaling overhead. For best multi-GPU performance, consider NVLink-equipped variants.
Usually yes. If you want to run 2-4× RTX 3090 Ti 24GB for local AI, the bottleneck often becomes the platform, not the card. Workstation and server boards give you more CPU PCIe lanes, better x16 slot wiring, more spacing between cards, stronger power delivery, and usually more RAM capacity. Consumer x8/x8 layouts can work, but they are a common weak point in multi-GPU builds.
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