Can the NVIDIA RTX 3080 10GB run Gemma 3 12B?

Yes, with heavy quantization
QuantQ3_K_MNoticeably degraded
Memory9.8 GBof 10 GB
Speed~76tokens/s

Only just. Gemma 3 12B fits on the NVIDIA RTX 3080 10GB at Q3_K_M, which costs noticeable quality. Expect about 76 tokens/second. A card with more memory is a better experience.

Try other context lengths in the calculator →
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Memory needed by quantization

At 8,192 tokens of context.

QuantQualityMemoryFits?Speed
FP16Full quality28.2 GBToo big—
Q8_0Near-lossless16.8 GBToo big—
Q6_KExcellent13.8 GBToo big—
Q5_K_MVery good12.5 GBToo big—
Q4_K_MGood, most popular11.2 GBToo big—
Q3_K_MNoticeably degraded9.8 GBFits~76 tok/s
Q2_KHeavily degraded8.4 GBFits~100 tok/s

How to run Gemma 3 12B on the NVIDIA RTX 3080 10GB

Ollama's default gemma3:12b download is Q4_K_M, which needs about 11.2 GB, more than the 10 GB available. Download the Q3_K_M GGUF instead (LM Studio lists quants per model), or try a smaller context length.

GPUs that run Gemma 3 12B comfortably

Check NVIDIA RTX 3060 12GB prices →

Models that run well on the NVIDIA RTX 3080 10GB