Rent a GPU

Can the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti run Gemma 2 9B?

RTX 3060 Ti × Gemma 2 9B8K context
Yes, with heavy quantizationFits only at a low-quality quant
Memory at Q3_K_M7.2 GB of 8 GB
Weights 4.5 GBKV cache 2.1 GBRuntime 0.6 GB
QuantQ3_K_MNoticeably degraded
Speed~60tokens per second
Max context8Kthe model's full window
  1. FP16
  2. Q8_0
  3. Q6_K
  4. Q5_K_M
  5. Q4_K_M
  6. Q3_K_M
  7. Q2_K

Only just. Gemma 2 9B fits on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti at Q3_K_M, which costs noticeable quality. Expect about 60 tokens/second. A card with more memory is a better experience.

Try other context lengths

Run it with Ollama

Ollama's default gemma2:9b download is Q4_K_M, which needs about 8.3 GB, more than the 8 GB available. Download the Q3_K_M GGUF instead (LM Studio lists quants per model), or try a smaller context length.

New to this? Step-by-step setup for the RTX 3060 Ti

Run it in the cloud

Want full quality? Run Gemma 2 9B on a bigger rented GPU.

Rent a cloud GPU by the hour. No upfront cost, stop any time. Not sure whether to rent or buy? Compare the cost.

Rent a GPU on RunPodRent a GPU on Vast.ai

Memory needed by quantization

At 8,192 tokens of context. The black line marks the 8 GB the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti can use.

QuantQualityMemoryFits?Speed
FP16Full quality21.2 GBToo big—
Q8_0Near-lossless12.5 GBToo big—
Q6_KExcellent10.3 GBToo big—
Q5_K_MVery good9.3 GBToo big—
Q4_K_MGood, most popular8.3 GBToo big—
Q3_K_MNoticeably degraded7.2 GBFits~60 tok/s
Q2_KHeavily degraded6.2 GBFits~78 tok/s

Measured speed from real RTX 3060 Ti owners

Tokens per second that people measured on their own NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti, next to our estimate.

No one has measured Gemma 2 9B on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti yet. The speeds above are estimates. Run the benchmark and yours becomes the first real number on this page.

Have an RTX 3060 Ti? Add your real speed

One command times Gemma 2 9B in your own Ollama, shows you exactly what it would send, and asks before sending anything. No sign-up, no personal data.

macOS and Linux

curl -fsSL https://gpufit.dev/bench.sh | sh -s -- gemma2:9b

Windows (PowerShell)

$env:GPUFIT_MODEL="gemma2:9b"; irm https://gpufit.dev/bench.ps1 | iex

How the benchmark works

GPUs that run Gemma 2 9B comfortably

Check RTX 3080 10GB prices

Models that run well on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti

Frequently asked questions

Can NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti run Gemma 2 9B?

Only just. Gemma 2 9B fits on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti at Q3_K_M, which costs noticeable quality. Expect about 60 tokens/second. A card with more memory is a better experience.

How much VRAM does Gemma 2 9B need?

About 8.3 GB at Q4_K_M with 8,192 tokens of context, and about 21.2 GB at full FP16 precision.

How fast is Gemma 2 9B on the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti?

Roughly 60 tokens per second at Q3_K_M, estimated from the NVIDIA RTX 3060 Ti's 448 GB/s memory bandwidth.