Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 vs QwQ 32B

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 and QwQ 32B match in llmrun Score, with values of 96.5 versus 96.1; both fit 24 GB at Q4_K_M; Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 is 5.4× faster on RTX 4090 (~173 vs ~32 tok/s).

Model A · Alibaba

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

96.5llmrun Score

30.5B · 3.4B active · 256K context · Apache 2.0 · Jul 2025

ChatFunctions

Model B · Alibaba

QwQ 32B

96.1llmrun Score

32.8B · 40K context · Apache 2.0 · Mar 2025

ChatReasoningFunctions

Which should you choose?

Choose Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 if you want…

Fits a 16 GB GPU
Q3_K_M · 16 GB; QwQ 32B needs 13.6 GB at its smallest quant
5.4× faster on RTX 4090
~173 vs ~32 tok/s
Longer context window
256K vs 40K tokens
Newer release
Jul 2025 vs Mar 2025

Choose QwQ 32B if you want…

Also does reasoning
Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 doesn't list it

On your hardware

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

MemoryQwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507QwQ 32B

8 GB

RTX 4060 · 8 GB tier

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Doesn't fit

smallest quant needs 9.5 GB

QwQ 32B

Doesn't fit

smallest quant needs 13.6 GB

12 GB

RTX 3060 12GB · 12 GB tier

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

IQ2_M · ~130 tok/s

11.4 GB · up to 16Kfits

QwQ 32B

Doesn't fit

smallest quant needs 13.6 GB

16 GB

RTX 5060 Ti 16GB · 16 GB tier

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q3_K_M · ~119 tok/s

16 GB · up to 16Kbetter quant

QwQ 32B

IQ2_M · ~25 tok/s

15.7 GB · up to 16K

24 GBreference

RTX 4090 · 24 GB tier

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q4_K_M · ~173 tok/s

19.4 GB · up to 64Kmore headroom

QwQ 32B

Q4_K_M · ~32 tok/stight

24.3 GB · up to 8K

32 GB

RTX 5090 · 32 GB tier

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q4_K_M · ~227 tok/s

19.4 GB · up to 256Kfaster

QwQ 32B

Q4_K_M · ~57 tok/s

24.3 GB · up to 40K

48 GB

RTX A6000 · 48 GB tier

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q4_K_M · ~148 tok/s

19.4 GB · up to 256Kfaster

QwQ 32B

Q4_K_M · ~24 tok/s

24.3 GB · up to 40K

Mac 32 GB

Mac Mini M4 · Macs

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q4_K_M · ~29 tok/s

19.4 GB · up to 128Kfaster

QwQ 32B

Q4_K_M · ~4 tok/s

24.3 GB · up to 16K

Mac 64 GB

Mac Studio M4 Max · Macs

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q4_K_M · ~67 tok/s

19.4 GB · up to 256Kfaster

QwQ 32B

Q4_K_M · ~19 tok/s

24.3 GB · up to 40K

Mac 128 GB

Mac Studio M4 Max · Macs

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Q4_K_M · ~67 tok/s

19.4 GB · up to 256Kfaster

QwQ 32B

Q4_K_M · ~19 tok/s

24.3 GB · up to 40K

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

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 QwQ 32B

Overall

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

96.593–100

QwQ 32B

96.193–99

Reasoning

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

91.984–100

QwQ 32B

no data

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 · #56 of 92 open models · #14 of 34 that fit 24 GB

QwQ 32B · #59 of 92 open models · #16 of 34 that fit 24 GB

Benchmarks

4 shared boards: Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 leads 2, QwQ 32B leads 2 · Benchmarks imported Oct 2026

BoardQwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507QwQ 32B

GPQA Diamond

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

55.6%#48/97 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Jul 2025

QwQ 32B

65.3%#37/97 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

LMArena Text

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

1382.4#59/186 open

ArenaLMArena · Oct 2026

QwQ 32B

1335.7#84/186 open

ArenaLMArena · Oct 2026

AIME 2024/2025

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

62.2%#35/85 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Jul 2025

QwQ 32B

59.2%#37/85 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

Chess Puzzles

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

2.0%#39/67 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Jul 2025

QwQ 32B

5.0%#32/67 open

IndependentEpoch AI · Mar 2025

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

Only Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 (2)

DTBench67.2%
LMCA22.4%

Only QwQ 32B (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.

QuantQwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507QwQ 32B

Q2_K

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

13.4 GB11.3 GB file

32K 14.9 GB · 128K 19.7 GB

QwQ 32B

14.8 GB12.3 GB file

32K 22.8 GB · 128K —

Q3_K_S

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

13.8 GB13.3 GB file

32K 15.3 GB · 128K 20.1 GB

QwQ 32B

15.2 GB14.4 GB file

32K 23.2 GB · 128K —

Q3_K_M

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

15.3 GB14.7 GB file

32K 16.8 GB · 128K 21.6 GB

QwQ 32B

16.8 GB15.9 GB file

32K 24.9 GB · 128K —

Q4_0

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

15.7 GB17.4 GB file

32K 17.2 GB · 128K 22.0 GB

QwQ 32B

17.2 GB18.7 GB file

32K 25.3 GB · 128K —

Q4_K_M

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

18.7 GB18.6 GB file

32K 20.2 GB · 128K 25.1 GB

QwQ 32B

20.5 GB19.9 GB file

32K 28.6 GB · 128K —

Q5_K_M

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

22.2 GB21.7 GB file

32K 23.7 GB · 128K 28.5 GB

QwQ 32B

24.2 GB23.3 GB file

32K 32.2 GB · 128K —

Q6_K

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

25.6 GB25.1 GB file

32K 27.1 GB · 128K 31.9 GB

QwQ 32B

27.9 GB26.9 GB file

32K 35.9 GB · 128K —

Q8_0

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

30.9 GB32.5 GB file

32K 32.4 GB · 128K 37.3 GB

QwQ 32B

33.6 GB34.8 GB file

32K 41.7 GB · 128K —

20 more quants

IQ2_XXS

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

8.8 GB10.3 GB file

32K 10.3 GB · 128K 15.1 GB

QwQ 32B

9.9 GB9.0 GB file

32K 17.9 GB · 128K —

IQ2_XS

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

9.6 GB8.7 GB file

32K 11.1 GB · 128K 15.9 GB

QwQ 32B

10.7 GB10.0 GB file

32K 18.7 GB · 128K —

IQ2_S

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

9.9 GB8.7 GB file

32K 11.5 GB · 128K 16.3 GB

QwQ 32B

11.1 GB10.4 GB file

32K 19.1 GB · 128K —

IQ2_M

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

10.7 GB10.8 GB file

32K 12.2 GB · 128K 17.1 GB

QwQ 32B

11.9 GB11.3 GB file

32K 19.9 GB · 128K —

IQ3_XXS

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

12.2 GB12.9 GB file

32K 13.7 GB · 128K 18.6 GB

QwQ 32B

13.5 GB12.8 GB file

32K 21.6 GB · 128K —

Q2_K_S

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

12.6 GB10.5 GB file

32K 14.1 GB · 128K 19.0 GB

QwQ 32B

13.9 GB11.5 GB file

32K 22.0 GB · 128K —

IQ3_XS

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

13.0 GB12.7 GB file

32K 14.5 GB · 128K 19.3 GB

QwQ 32B

14.4 GB13.7 GB file

32K 22.4 GB · 128K —

IQ3_S

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

13.4 GB10.3 GB file

32K 14.9 GB · 128K 19.7 GB

QwQ 32B

14.8 GB14.4 GB file

32K 22.8 GB · 128K —

IQ3_M

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

14.1 GB14.1 GB file

32K 15.7 GB · 128K 20.5 GB

QwQ 32B

15.6 GB14.8 GB file

32K 23.6 GB · 128K —

Q3_K_L

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

16.1 GB15.9 GB file

32K 17.6 GB · 128K 22.4 GB

QwQ 32B

17.6 GB17.2 GB file

32K 25.7 GB · 128K —

IQ4_XS

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

16.8 GB16.4 GB file

32K 18.3 GB · 128K 23.2 GB

QwQ 32B

18.5 GB17.7 GB file

32K 26.5 GB · 128K —

IQ4_NL

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

17.6 GB17.3 GB file

32K 19.1 GB · 128K 23.9 GB

QwQ 32B

19.3 GB18.7 GB file

32K 27.3 GB · 128K —

Q4_1

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

17.6 GB19.2 GB file

32K 19.1 GB · 128K 23.9 GB

QwQ 32B

19.3 GB20.6 GB file

32K 27.3 GB · 128K —

Q4_K_S

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

17.6 GB17.5 GB file

32K 19.1 GB · 128K 23.9 GB

QwQ 32B

19.3 GB18.8 GB file

32K 27.3 GB · 128K —

Q4_K_L

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

19.1 GB18.9 GB file

32K 20.6 GB · 128K 25.4 GB

QwQ 32B

20.9 GB20.4 GB file

32K 29.0 GB · 128K —

Q5_0

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

19.5 GB21.1 GB file

32K 21.0 GB · 128K 25.8 GB

QwQ 32B

21.3 GB22.6 GB file

32K 29.4 GB · 128K —

Q5_1

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

not listed

QwQ 32B

23.4 GB24.6 GB file

32K 31.4 GB · 128K —

Q5_K_S

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

21.4 GB21.1 GB file

32K 22.9 GB · 128K 27.7 GB

QwQ 32B

23.4 GB22.6 GB file

32K 31.4 GB · 128K —

Q5_K_L

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

22.5 GB21.9 GB file

32K 24.1 GB · 128K 28.9 GB

QwQ 32B

24.6 GB23.7 GB file

32K 32.6 GB · 128K —

BF16

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

61.5 GB61.1 GB file

32K 63.0 GB · 128K 67.8 GB

QwQ 32B

66.4 GB65.5 GB file

32K 74.4 GB · 128K —

How to run each

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507

Ollama · Q4_K_M

$ollama run hf.co/unsloth/Qwen3-30B-A3B-Instruct-2507-GGUF:Q4_K_M

All ways to run Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 →

QwQ 32B

Ollama · Q4_K_M

$ollama run hf.co/MaziyarPanahi/QwQ-32B-GGUF:Q4_K_M

All ways to run QwQ 32B →

Specifications

Specifications of Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 and QwQ 32B
Spec	Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507	QwQ 32B
Publisher	Alibaba	Alibaba
Parameters	30.5B	32.8B
Active parameters	3.4B per token	—
Architecture	Qwen3MoeForCausalLM	Qwen2ForCausalLM
Context	256K tokens	40K tokens
Modalities	Chat, Function-calling	Chat, Reasoning, Function-calling
License	Apache 2.0	Apache 2.0
Released	Jul 2025	Mar 2025

Frequently Asked Questions

Which is better, Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 or QwQ 32B?

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 and QwQ 32B match in llmrun Score, with values of 96.5 versus 96.1; both fit 24 GB at Q4_K_M; Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 is 5.4× faster on RTX 4090 (~173 vs ~32 tok/s). Choose Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 for fits a 16 GB GPU and 5.4× faster on RTX 4090; choose QwQ 32B for also does reasoning.

Which needs less VRAM, Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 or QwQ 32B?

At Q4_K_M, Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 requires 18.7 GB while QwQ 32B needs 20.5 GB, making Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 the easier model to run on your local setup.

Which is faster on RTX 4090?

Estimated decode speed on RTX 4090 is about 173 tok/s for Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 (Q4_K_M) and 32 tok/s for QwQ 32B (Q4_K_M), so Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 is faster. Estimates, ±20%.

Can I run Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 or QwQ 32B on a 16 GB GPU?

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 fits at Q3_K_M; QwQ 32B fits at IQ2_M.

Which has a longer context window, Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 or QwQ 32B?

Qwen3 30B A3B Instruct 2507 supports 262,144 tokens and QwQ 32B supports 40,960 tokens.