Nous Dolphin 13B needs ~36.6 GB VRAM. MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB has 92.2 GB. With Q5_K_M quantization, expect ~26 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
26.2 tok/s
TTFT
7402 ms
Safe context
16K
Memory
36.6 GB / 92.2 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 | B | Runs well | 26.2 tok/s | 4038 ms | 16K |
| Coding | B | Runs well | 26.2 tok/s | 7402 ms | 16K |
| Agentic Coding | B | Runs well | 26.2 tok/s | 10767 ms | 16K |
| Reasoning | B | Runs well | 26.2 tok/s | 8748 ms | 16K |
| RAG | B | Runs well | 26.2 tok/s | 13459 ms | 16K |
How Nous Dolphin 13B (13B params) fits at each quantization level on MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB (92.2 GB usable).
| Quant | Bits | VRAM | Quality | Fit |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Q2_K | 2 | 5.1 GB | Low | B60 |
Q3_K_S | 3 | 6.4 GB | Low | B60 |
NVFP4 | 4 | 7.3 GB | Medium | B60 |
Q4_K_M | 4 | 7.9 GB | Medium | B60 |
Q5_K_M | 5 | 9.4 GB | High | B60 |
Q6_K | 6 | 10.7 GB | High | B60 |
Q8_0 | 8 | 13.9 GB | Very High | B61 |
F16Best for your GPU | 16 | 26.7 GB | Maximum | B62 |
Copy-paste commands to run Nous Dolphin 13B on your machine.
Run
docker run --rm -it ghcr.io/ggerganov/llama.cpp:full \
--hf-repo "nousresearch/Nous-Dolphin-13B" \
--hf-file "Nous-Dolphin-13B-Q5_K_M.gguf" \
-c 4096 -ngl 99アップグレードオプション
Raises estimated decode speed by about 132%.
Adds memory headroom for longer context windows and future model growth.
〜$6,999 MSRP
RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Workstation Edition 96GBコスパ最良Raises estimated decode speed by about 526%.
〜$9,999 MSRP
Yes, MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB can run Nous Dolphin 13B with a B grade (Runs well). Expected decode speed: 26.2 tok/s.
Nous Dolphin 13B (13B parameters) requires approximately 36.6 GB of memory with Q5_K_M quantization.
The recommended quantization for Nous Dolphin 13B is Q5_K_M, which balances quality and memory efficiency.
On MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB, Nous Dolphin 13B achieves approximately 26.2 tokens per second decode speed with a time-to-first-token of 7402ms using Q5_K_M quantization.
For coding workloads, Nous Dolphin 13B on MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB receives a B grade with 26.2 tok/s and 16K context.
On MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB, Nous Dolphin 13B can safely use up to 16K tokens of context. The model's official context limit is 16K, but available memory constrains the safe maximum.
Not always. MacBook Pro M3 Max 128GB 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.
Paste this snippet into any page to show a live fit card.
<iframe src="https://willitrunai.com/embed/nous-dolphin-13b-on-m3-max-128gb" width="400" height="180" frameborder="0" style="border:none;border-radius:12px;overflow:hidden;" title="Will It Run AI — fit result"></iframe>
Preview: