Can Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct run on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB?

YES — Tight Fit

S87Excellent

Estimated from fit model

Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct needs ~21.9 GB VRAM. MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB has 25.9 GB. With Q4_K_M quantization, expect ~8 tok/s.

Runtime: llama.cppCapacity: TightBandwidth: Very lowStack: StandardBottleneck: Memory bandwidth

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) — 21.9 GB, 8.0 tok/s, Tight fit

21.9 GB required25.9 GB available

85% VRAM used

Fit status

Tight fit

Decode

8.0 tok/s

TTFT

24078 ms

Safe context

43K

Memory

21.9 GB / 25.9 GB

Memory breakdown

Weights14.6 GB

KV Cache2.4 GB

Runtime0.9 GB

Headroom3.9 GB

See how fast it feels

See how fast it feelsDevstral Small 2 24B Instruct on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB
1st promptCold start — includes initialization
>Write a Python function to sort a list
Here's a Python function that sorts a list using quicksort:

def quicksort(arr):
    if len(arr) <= 1:
        return arr
    pivot = arr[len(arr) // 2]
    left   = [x for x in arr if x < pivot]
    middle = [x for x in arr if x == pivot]
    right  = [x for x in arr if x > pivot]
    return quicksort(left) + middle + quicksort(right)

# Example usage
numbers = [3, 6, 8, 10, 1, 2, 1]
print(quicksort(numbers))  # [1, 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10]

The algorithm picks a pivot, partitions the list into smaller, equal, and larger elements, then recursively sorts each partition and concatenates the results.
2nd promptWarm — model ready, no init overhead
>Now add type hints and a docstring
def quicksort(arr: list[int]) -> list[int]:
    """Sort a list using the quicksort algorithm.

    Args:
        arr: List of integers to sort.

    Returns:
        A new sorted list.
    """
    if len(arr) <= 1:
        return arr
    pivot = arr[len(arr) // 2]
    left   = [x for x in arr if x < pivot]
    middle = [x for x in arr if x == pivot]
    right  = [x for x in arr if x > pivot]
    return quicksort(left) + middle + quicksort(right)

Added type hints for the input and return type, plus a Google-style docstring.
Estimated: 8.0 tok/s decode · 24.1s TTFT (warm) · 20 tok/s prefill

What limits this setup

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.

Best improvement path

Performance by workload

Workload	Grade	Fit	Decode	TTFT	Context
Chat	S	Runs well	8.0 tok/s	13134 ms	43K
Coding	S	Tight fit	8.0 tok/s	24078 ms	43K
Agentic Coding	S	Tight fit	8.0 tok/s	35023 ms	43K
Reasoning	S	Tight fit	8.0 tok/s	28456 ms	43K
RAG	S	Tight fit	8.0 tok/s	43779 ms	43K

Inference speed

Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct inference speed — tokens per second by GPU & Mac

Estimated decode speed (tokens/sec) for Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct at Q4_K_M across popular GPUs and Apple Silicon, using the fastest local runtime per device. Fastest is RTX 5090 32GB at ~88 tok/s. Speed is memory-bandwidth bound, so cards that fit the whole model in VRAM run far faster than ones that offload to system RAM.

GPU / Mac	Memory	Quant	Speed (tok/s)	Fits?
RTX 5090 32GB	32 GB	Q4_K_M	88.2	Fits
RTX 4090 24GB	24 GB	Q4_K_M	56.3	Tight
RX 7900 XTX 24GB	24 GB	Q4_K_M	50.8	Tight
RTX 3090 24GB	24 GB	Q4_K_M	48.1	Tight
Mac Studio M3 Ultra 256GB	256 GB	Q4_K_M	40.9	Fits
MacBook Pro M4 Max 128GB	128 GB	Q4_K_M	36.8	Fits
MacBook Pro M4 Max 64GB	64 GB	Q4_K_M	36.8	Fits
Mac Studio M2 Ultra 128GB	128 GB	Q4_K_M	34.1	Fits
Mac Studio M1 Ultra 128GB	128 GB	Q4_K_M	32.3	Fits
MacBook Pro M4 Pro 48GB	48 GB	Q4_K_M	23.2	Fits
RTX 4080 Super 16GB	16 GB	Q4_K_M	21.3	Too big
MacBook Pro M3 Max 64GB	64 GB	Q4_K_M	17.6	Fits
MacBook Pro M1 Max 64GB	64 GB	Q4_K_M	16.2	Fits
RTX 4070 12GB	12 GB	Q4_K_M	7.5	Too big
RTX 3060 12GB	12 GB	Q4_K_M	4.7	Too big
RTX 4060 8GB	8 GB	Q4_K_M	2.2	Too big

Estimates for single-stream decoding at Q4_K_M; real tokens/sec varies with prompt length, context, batch size, and runtime build. Prompt processing (prefill) is faster than the decode figures shown here.

Quantization options

How Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct (24B params) fits at each quantization level on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB (25.9 GB usable).

Quant	Bits	VRAM	Quality	Fit
Q2_K	2	9.4 GB	Low	S89
Q3_K_S	3	11.8 GB	Low	S91
NVFP4	4	13.4 GB	Medium	S91
Q4_K_M	4	14.6 GB	Medium	S91
Q5_K_M	5	17.3 GB	High	S91
Q6_KBest for your GPU	6	19.7 GB	High	S91
Q8_0	8	25.7 GB	Very High	F0
F16	16	49.2 GB	Maximum	F0

Get started

Copy-paste commands to run Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct on your machine.

Run

ollama run devstral-small-2

Your hardware

More models your MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB can run

Model	Params	Grade	Decode
Qwen3-Coder 30B A3B Instruct	30.5B	S	16.6 tok/s
Qwen 3.5 27B	27B	S	7.2 tok/s
Qwen 3.6 27B	27B	S	5.5 tok/s
Qwen 3.6 35B A3B	35B	A	12.1 tok/s
Qwen3-VL 30B A3B Instruct	30B	S	17.1 tok/s

Frequently asked questions

Can MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB run Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct?

Yes, MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB can run Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct with a S grade (Tight fit). Expected decode speed: 8.0 tok/s.

How much VRAM does Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct need?

Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct (24B parameters) requires approximately 21.9 GB of memory with Q4_K_M quantization.

What is the best quantization for Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct?

The recommended quantization for Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct is Q4_K_M, which balances quality and memory efficiency.

What speed will Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct run at on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB?

On MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB, Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct achieves approximately 8.0 tokens per second decode speed with a time-to-first-token of 24078ms using Q4_K_M quantization.

Can MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB run Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct for coding?

For coding workloads, Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB receives a S grade with 8.0 tok/s and 43K context.

What context window can Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct use on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB?

On MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB, Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct can safely use up to 43K tokens of context. The model's official context limit is 256K, but available memory constrains the safe maximum.

Is unified memory on MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB as fast as VRAM for Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct?

Not always. MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB 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.

See all results for MacBook Pro M3 Pro 36GB See all hardware for Devstral Small 2 24B Instruct

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