Gemma 3 12B IT vs Gemma 3 27B IT

Gemma 3 27B IT leads llmrun Score 79.3 to 74.2 (ranges overlap); both fit 24 GB at Q4_K_M; Gemma 3 12B IT is 2.3× faster on RTX 4090 (~82 vs ~36 tok/s).

Model A · Google

Gemma 3 12B IT

74.2llmrun Score

12.2B · 32K context · Gemma Terms · Mar 2025

Vision

Model B · Google

Gemma 3 27B IT

79.3llmrun Score

27.4B · 128K context · Gemma Terms · Mar 2025

Vision

Which should you choose?

Choose Gemma 3 12B IT if you want…

Fits a 12 GB GPU
Q4_K_M · 10.9 GB; Gemma 3 27B IT needs 11.9 GB at its smallest quant
2.3× faster on RTX 4090
~82 vs ~36 tok/s
Lighter on memory
8.0 vs 18.1 GB at Q4_K_M

Choose Gemma 3 27B IT if you want…

Higher llmrun Score
79.3 vs 74.2, ranges overlap
Stronger at science
80.3 vs 71.7
Stronger at reasoning
73.5 vs 66.0
Ahead on the benchmarks
7 of 9 shared boards
Longer context window
128K vs 32K tokens

On your hardware

Each model at its default quant (Q4_K_M), a smaller one when it must. Estimates, ±20%.

MemoryGemma 3 12B ITGemma 3 27B IT

8 GB

RTX 4060 · 8 GB tier

Gemma 3 12B IT

IQ2_M · ~39 tok/s

7.4 GB · up to 16Kfits

Gemma 3 27B IT

Doesn't fit

smallest quant needs 11.9 GB

12 GB

RTX 3060 12GB · 12 GB tier

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~29 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 16Kmore headroom

Gemma 3 27B IT

IQ2_XXS · ~28 tok/s

11.9 GB · up to 16K

16 GB

RTX 5060 Ti 16GB · 16 GB tier

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~36 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kmore headroom

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q2_K_S · ~24 tok/s

15.7 GB · up to 16K

24 GBreference

RTX 4090 · 24 GB tier

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~82 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kfaster

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q4_K_M · ~36 tok/s

21.7 GB · up to 16K

32 GB

RTX 5090 · 32 GB tier

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~145 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kfaster

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q4_K_M · ~64 tok/s

21.7 GB · up to 32K

48 GB

RTX A6000 · 48 GB tier

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~62 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kfaster

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q4_K_M · ~28 tok/s

21.7 GB · up to 64K

Mac 32 GB

Mac Mini M4 · Macs

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~10 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kfaster

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q4_K_M · ~5 tok/s

21.7 GB · up to 32K

Mac 64 GB

Mac Studio M4 Max · Macs

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~48 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kfaster

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q4_K_M · ~21 tok/s

21.7 GB · up to 128K

Mac 128 GB

Mac Studio M4 Max · Macs

Gemma 3 12B IT

Q4_K_M · ~48 tok/s

10.9 GB · up to 32Kfaster

Gemma 3 27B IT

Q4_K_M · ~21 tok/s

21.7 GB · up to 128K

Reference GPU: RTX 4090. Tinted cell = the better pick on that machine (fits, more headroom, or at least 10% faster).

llmrun Score

with its 90% range · bars share one scale

Gemma 3 12B IT Gemma 3 27B IT

Overall

Gemma 3 12B IT

74.269–80

Gemma 3 27B IT

79.375–83

Coding

Gemma 3 12B IT

no data

Gemma 3 27B IT

68.753–85

Science

Gemma 3 12B IT

71.761–83

Gemma 3 27B IT

80.372–89

Reasoning

Gemma 3 12B IT

66.052–80

Gemma 3 27B IT

73.562–85

Gemma 3 12B IT · #82 of 92 open models · #26 of 34 that fit 24 GB

Gemma 3 27B IT · #78 of 92 open models · #24 of 34 that fit 24 GB

Benchmarks

9 shared boards: Gemma 3 12B IT leads 0, Gemma 3 27B IT leads 7 · Benchmarks imported Oct 2026

BoardGemma 3 12B ITGemma 3 27B IT

GPQA Diamond

Gemma 3 12B IT

39.5%#70/97 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

47.7%#56/97 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

LMArena Text

Gemma 3 12B IT

1341.8#82/186 open

ArenaLMArena · Oct 2026

Gemma 3 27B IT

1365.4#65/186 open

ArenaLMArena · Oct 2026

AIME 2024/2025

Gemma 3 12B IT

16.7%#54/85 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

22.5%#51/85 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

MMLU-Pro

Gemma 3 12B IT

60.6%#57/144 open

IndependentTIGER-Lab

Gemma 3 27B IT

67.5%#43/144 open

IndependentTIGER-Lab

SciCode

Gemma 3 12B IT

17.4%#62/65 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

21.2%#61/65 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Chess Puzzles

Gemma 3 12B IT

0.0%#48/67 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

0.0%#50/67 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

CritPt

Gemma 3 12B IT

0.0%#48/65 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

0.0%#49/65 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

DTBench

Gemma 3 12B IT

48.8%#62/68 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

52.5%#57/68 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

LMCA

Gemma 3 12B IT

4.5%#53/54 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Gemma 3 27B IT

12.3%#45/54 open

Lab-reportedEpoch AI · Mar 2025

3 more boards (other shared and single-model boards)

Only Gemma 3 27B IT (3)

VRAM by quantization

Memory to load the model and 2K context; below it, the total at 32K and 128K context. Lighter side in bold.

QuantGemma 3 12B ITGemma 3 27B IT

Q2_K

Gemma 3 12B IT

5.7 GB4.8 GB file

32K 11.9 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

12.8 GB10.5 GB file

32K 20.6 GB · 128K 45.4 GB

Q3_K_S

Gemma 3 12B IT

5.9 GB5.5 GB file

32K 12.1 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

13.2 GB12.2 GB file

32K 21.0 GB · 128K 45.8 GB

Q3_K_M

Gemma 3 12B IT

6.5 GB6.0 GB file

32K 12.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

14.7 GB13.4 GB file

32K 22.5 GB · 128K 47.3 GB

Q4_0

Gemma 3 12B IT

6.7 GB6.9 GB file

32K 12.9 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

15.1 GB15.6 GB file

32K 22.9 GB · 128K 47.7 GB

Q4_K_M

Gemma 3 12B IT

8.0 GB7.3 GB file

32K 14.2 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

18.1 GB16.5 GB file

32K 25.9 GB · 128K 50.7 GB

Q5_K_M

Gemma 3 12B IT

9.6 GB8.4 GB file

32K 15.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

21.5 GB19.3 GB file

32K 29.3 GB · 128K 54.1 GB

Q6_K

Gemma 3 12B IT

11.1 GB9.7 GB file

32K 17.3 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

24.9 GB22.2 GB file

32K 32.7 GB · 128K 57.5 GB

Q8_0

Gemma 3 12B IT

13.4 GB12.5 GB file

32K 19.6 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

30.2 GB28.7 GB file

32K 37.9 GB · 128K 62.8 GB

20 more quants

IQ2_XXS

Gemma 3 12B IT

3.7 GB3.6 GB file

32K 9.9 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

8.3 GB7.9 GB file

32K 16.1 GB · 128K 40.9 GB

IQ2_XS

Gemma 3 12B IT

4.0 GB3.8 GB file

32K 10.2 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

9.1 GB8.4 GB file

32K 16.8 GB · 128K 41.7 GB

IQ2_S

Gemma 3 12B IT

4.2 GB4.0 GB file

32K 10.4 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

9.4 GB8.8 GB file

32K 17.2 GB · 128K 42.0 GB

IQ2_M

Gemma 3 12B IT

4.5 GB4.4 GB file

32K 10.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

10.2 GB9.6 GB file

32K 17.9 GB · 128K 42.8 GB

IQ3_XXS

Gemma 3 12B IT

5.2 GB4.8 GB file

32K 11.4 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

11.7 GB10.8 GB file

32K 19.5 GB · 128K 44.3 GB

Q2_K_S

Gemma 3 12B IT

5.4 GB4.4 GB file

32K 11.6 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

12.1 GB9.8 GB file

32K 19.8 GB · 128K 44.7 GB

IQ3_XS

Gemma 3 12B IT

5.5 GB5.2 GB file

32K 11.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

12.5 GB11.6 GB file

32K 20.2 GB · 128K 45.1 GB

IQ3_S

Gemma 3 12B IT

5.7 GB5.5 GB file

32K 11.9 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

12.8 GB12.2 GB file

32K 20.6 GB · 128K 45.4 GB

IQ3_M

Gemma 3 12B IT

6.0 GB5.7 GB file

32K 12.2 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

13.6 GB12.5 GB file

32K 21.3 GB · 128K 46.2 GB

Q3_K_L

Gemma 3 12B IT

6.9 GB6.5 GB file

32K 13.1 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

15.5 GB14.5 GB file

32K 23.2 GB · 128K 48.1 GB

IQ4_XS

Gemma 3 12B IT

7.2 GB6.6 GB file

32K 13.4 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

16.2 GB14.8 GB file

32K 24.0 GB · 128K 48.8 GB

IQ4_NL

Gemma 3 12B IT

7.5 GB6.9 GB file

32K 13.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

17.0 GB15.6 GB file

32K 24.7 GB · 128K 49.6 GB

Q4_1

Gemma 3 12B IT

7.5 GB7.6 GB file

32K 13.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

17.0 GB17.2 GB file

32K 24.7 GB · 128K 49.6 GB

Q4_K_S

Gemma 3 12B IT

7.5 GB6.9 GB file

32K 13.7 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

17.0 GB15.7 GB file

32K 24.7 GB · 128K 49.6 GB

Q4_K_L

Gemma 3 12B IT

8.2 GB7.5 GB file

32K 14.4 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

18.5 GB16.9 GB file

32K 26.2 GB · 128K 51.1 GB

Q5_0

Gemma 3 12B IT

8.4 GB8.2 GB file

32K 14.6 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

18.9 GB18.8 GB file

32K 26.6 GB · 128K 51.5 GB

Q5_1

Gemma 3 12B IT

not listed

Gemma 3 27B IT

20.8 GB20.4 GB file

32K 28.5 GB · 128K 53.4 GB

Q5_K_S

Gemma 3 12B IT

9.2 GB8.2 GB file

32K 15.4 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

20.8 GB18.8 GB file

32K 28.5 GB · 128K 53.4 GB

Q5_K_L

Gemma 3 12B IT

9.7 GB8.7 GB file

32K 15.9 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

21.9 GB19.6 GB file

32K 29.6 GB · 128K 54.5 GB

BF16

Gemma 3 12B IT

26.8 GB23.5 GB file

32K 33.0 GB · 128K —

Gemma 3 27B IT

60.4 GB54.0 GB file

32K 68.1 GB · 128K 93.0 GB

How to run each

Gemma 3 12B IT

Ollama · Q4_K_M

$ollama run hf.co/MaziyarPanahi/gemma-3-12b-it-GGUF:Q4_K_M

All ways to run Gemma 3 12B IT →

Gemma 3 27B IT

Ollama · Q4_K_M

$ollama run hf.co/MaziyarPanahi/gemma-3-27b-it-GGUF:Q4_K_M

All ways to run Gemma 3 27B IT →

Specifications

Specifications of Gemma 3 12B IT and Gemma 3 27B IT
Spec	Gemma 3 12B IT	Gemma 3 27B IT
Publisher	Google	Google
Parameters	12.2B	27.4B
Context	32K tokens	128K tokens
Modalities	Vision	Vision
License	Gemma Terms	Gemma Terms
Released	Mar 2025	Mar 2025

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, Gemma 3 12B IT or Gemma 3 27B IT?

Gemma 3 27B IT leads llmrun Score 79.3 to 74.2 (ranges overlap); both fit 24 GB at Q4_K_M; Gemma 3 12B IT is 2.3× faster on RTX 4090 (~82 vs ~36 tok/s). Choose Gemma 3 12B IT for fits a 12 GB GPU and 2.3× faster on RTX 4090; choose Gemma 3 27B IT for higher llmrun Score and stronger at science.

Which needs less VRAM, Gemma 3 12B IT or Gemma 3 27B IT?

At Q4_K_M, Gemma 3 12B IT requires 8.0 GB while Gemma 3 27B IT needs 18.1 GB, making Gemma 3 12B IT the easier model to run on your local setup.

Which is faster on RTX 4090?

Estimated decode speed on RTX 4090 is about 82 tok/s for Gemma 3 12B IT (Q4_K_M) and 36 tok/s for Gemma 3 27B IT (Q4_K_M), so Gemma 3 12B IT is faster. Estimates, ±20%.

Can I run Gemma 3 12B IT or Gemma 3 27B IT on a 16 GB GPU?

Gemma 3 12B IT fits at Q4_K_M; Gemma 3 27B IT fits at Q2_K_S.

Which has a longer context window, Gemma 3 12B IT or Gemma 3 27B IT?

Gemma 3 12B IT supports 32,768 tokens and Gemma 3 27B IT supports 131,072 tokens.