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Can the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti run Llama 3.1 8B?

RTX 3080 Ti × Llama 3.1 8B8K context
YesRuns fully on the GPU
Memory at Q8_010.2 GB of 12 GB
Weights 8.5 GBKV cache 1.1 GBRuntime 0.6 GB
QuantQ8_0Near-lossless
Speed~64tokens per second
Max context20Ktokens that fit at Q8_0
  1. FP16
  2. Q8_0
  3. Q6_K
  4. Q5_K_M
  5. Q4_K_M
  6. Q3_K_M
  7. Q2_K

Yes. The NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti can run Llama 3.1 8B fully in VRAM at Q8_0 (near-lossless), using about 10.2 GB of the 12 GB available, at roughly 64 tokens/second.

Try other context lengths

Run it with Ollama

With Ollama installed, one command downloads and starts Llama 3.1 8B:

ollama run llama3.1:8b

Ollama's default download is Q4_K_M (about 6.5 GB here). You have room for Q8_0, which is near-lossless: pick that GGUF in LM Studio or from Hugging Face.

New to this? Step-by-step setup for the RTX 3080 Ti

Run it in the cloud

No NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti? Run Llama 3.1 8B in the cloud.

Rent a cloud GPU by the hour. No upfront cost, stop any time.

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 12 GB the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti can use.

QuantQualityMemoryFits?Speed
FP16Full quality17.7 GBToo big—
Q8_0Near-lossless10.2 GBFits~64 tok/s
Q6_KExcellent8.3 GBFits~83 tok/s
Q5_K_MVery good7.4 GBFits~96 tok/s
Q4_K_MGood, most popular6.5 GBFits~112 tok/s
Q3_K_MNoticeably degraded5.6 GBFits~139 tok/s
Q2_KHeavily degraded4.7 GBFits~182 tok/s

Measured speed from real RTX 3080 Ti owners

Tokens per second that people measured on their own NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti, next to our estimate.

No one has measured Llama 3.1 8B on the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti yet. The speeds above are estimates. Run the benchmark and yours becomes the first real number on this page.

Have an RTX 3080 Ti? Add your real speed

One command times Llama 3.1 8B 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 -- llama3.1:8b

Windows (PowerShell)

$env:GPUFIT_MODEL="llama3.1:8b"; irm https://gpufit.dev/bench.ps1 | iex

How the benchmark works

GPUs that run Llama 3.1 8B comfortably

Models that run well on the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti

Frequently asked questions

Can NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti run Llama 3.1 8B?

Yes. The NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti can run Llama 3.1 8B fully in VRAM at Q8_0 (near-lossless), using about 10.2 GB of the 12 GB available, at roughly 64 tokens/second.

How much VRAM does Llama 3.1 8B need?

About 6.5 GB at Q4_K_M with 8,192 tokens of context, and about 17.7 GB at full FP16 precision.

How fast is Llama 3.1 8B on the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti?

Roughly 64 tokens per second at Q8_0, estimated from the NVIDIA RTX 3080 Ti's 912 GB/s memory bandwidth.