llmrun

Apple · M1 Max · Laptop

Best AI Models for MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB)

Runs 27–35B models well and fits 120B MoE; dense 70B fits but is slow at 6 tok/s.

64 GB unified60.5 GB for models400 GB/s21 TFLOPS FP162021
Memory
32 GB64 GB
Same chip in
MacBook Pro 16"Mac StudioMacBook Pro 14"

What LLMs can the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max run?

#ModelSpeedllmrun ScoreQuant · Memory
1
Qwen3.8 27BAlibabaHow to run →
Q4_K_M · 17.9 GB
16.1 tok/sQ4_K_M · 17.9 GB
2
Qwen3.6 27BAlibaba
Q4_K_M · 17.9 GB
16.1 tok/sQ4_K_M · 17.9 GB
3
Gemma 4 26B A4B ITGoogle
Q4_K_M · 16.5 GB
63.2 tok/sQ4_K_M · 16.5 GB
4
GPT OSS 20BOpenAI
Q4_K_M · 13.1 GB
71.2 tok/sQ4_K_M · 13.1 GB
5
NVIDIA Nemotron 3.5 Lightning 30B A3B BF16NVIDIA
Q4_K_M · 19.3 GB
64.3 tok/sQ4_K_M · 19.3 GB
See all 338 models on the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max →Bars = traction for models without a Score yet
Task rankings use that task's benchmarks, topped up from Overall when short; bars mark well-known models with no Score yet.

About the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB)

The MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max is a 64 GB laptop with more memory than speed: it runs 27–35B models well and fits 120B MoE. macOS keeps about 3.5 GB, leaving 60.5 GB for models. Prompt reading is its weak spot: a 4K-token prompt waits 55 s before the first word on Qwen3.8 27B. M1 Max generation, released 2021; the newer M2 Max writes 0% faster with 1.3× the compute.

Speed in 64 GB#6400 GB/s
Prompt reading#921 TFLOPS
For models60.5 GBmacOS keeps 3.5 GB
ChipM1 Maxreleased 2021

MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max strengths and weaknesses

Strengths

  • Runs 120B MoE models: GPT OSS 120B at 57.0 tok/s in 59.1 GB
  • Room for long context: Qwen3.8 27B at Q4 uses 17.9 GB, leaving 42.6 GB free

Weaknesses

  • Slow on large dense models: Llama 3.3 70B Instruct at 6.0 tok/s
  • Slow prompt reading: A 32K-token prompt on Qwen3.8 27B waits 7.3 min for the first token
  • No CUDA: vLLM, AWQ, GPTQ and FP8 builds don't run; use GGUF or MLX

Memory for models

60.5 GB of 64 GB
9B6.6 GB14B11.9 GB35B MoE22 GB70B51.3 GB120B MoE59.1 GB
35B MoE22 GB120B MoE59.1 GB
For models 60.5 GBmacOS keeps 3.5 GBModel size at Q4

Everything on the size ladder fits. Two 27B-class models together use 35.7 GB and leave 24.8 GB free.

Similar devices and alternatives

Other memory sizes of the same machine first, then machines and GPUs people weigh against it, each with the one reason it is worth a look. Speeds on Qwen3.6 35B A3B.

Same chip, 32 GB less memoryMacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (32 GB)Apple · 28.5 GB for models · M1 Max
same speed▼ 32 GBno price
Same family18% faster, same memoryMac Studio M4 Max (64 GB)Apple · 60.5 GB for models · M4 Max
▲ 18% speedsame memoryabout $2,699
41% faster, 11.5 GB more memoryMac Studio M3 Ultra (96 GB)Apple · 72 GB for models · M3 Ultra
▲ 41% speed▲ 11.5 GBabout $3,999
Newer laptop, 15% slowerMacBook Pro 14 M5 ProApple · 48 GB for models · M5 Pro
▼ 15% speed▼ 12.5 GBabout $2,299
2.8× faster if your models fit in 24 GBRTX 4090NVIDIA · 24 GB VRAM · GPU
▲ 177% speed▼ 36.5 GBabout $1,599rent $0.34/hr
3.9× faster if your models fit in 32 GBRTX 5090NVIDIA · 32 GB VRAM · GPU
▲ 291% speed▼ 28.5 GBabout $5,376rent $0.64/hr

MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max tokens per second by model size

Output speed depends on memory bandwidth (400 GB/s). Grey rows need more than the 60.5 GB available.

  1. 9BQwen3.5 9B · Q4_K_M · 6.6 GB
    44.0tok/s
  2. 14BQwen3 14B · Q4_K_M · 11.9 GB
    29.5tok/s
  3. 27–31BQwen3.8 27B · Q4_K_M · 17.9 GB
    16.1tok/s
  4. 35B MoEQwen3.6 35B A3B · Q4_K_M · 22.0 GB
    54.5tok/s
  5. 70BLlama 3.3 70B Instruct · Q4_K_M · 51.3 GB slow
    6.0tok/s
  6. 120B MoEGPT OSS 120B · Q4_0 · 59.1 GB tight · Q4_0
    57.0tok/s

Estimated speeds: Q4_K_M, 4K context, one user. How we estimate

Max generations: writing vs compute

M1 Max → M5 Max
Writing speed (tok/s)Compute (TFLOPS FP16)
1×2×3×4×M1 Max2021M2 Max2023M3 Max2023M4 Max2024M5 Max2026M1 Max · 20.8 TFLOPS FP16M1 Max · 54.5 tok/s · 400 GB/sM2 Max · 27.2 TFLOPS FP16M2 Max · 54.5 tok/s · 400 GB/sM3 Max · 28.7 TFLOPS FP16M3 Max · 55.2 tok/s · 409.6 GB/sM4 Max · 34.4 TFLOPS FP16M4 Max · 64.2 tok/s · 546 GB/sM5 Max · 68 TFLOPS FP16M5 Max · 67.8 tok/s · 614 GB/sCompute 3.3×Writing +24%
1×2×3×4×M12021M22023M32023M42024M52026M1 Max · 20.8 TFLOPS FP16M1 Max · 54.5 tok/s · 400 GB/sM2 Max · 27.2 TFLOPS FP16M2 Max · 54.5 tok/s · 400 GB/sM3 Max · 28.7 TFLOPS FP16M3 Max · 55.2 tok/s · 409.6 GB/sM4 Max · 34.4 TFLOPS FP16M4 Max · 64.2 tok/s · 546 GB/sM5 Max · 68 TFLOPS FP16M5 Max · 67.8 tok/s · 614 GB/sCompute 3.3×Writing +24%

Writing speed follows memory bandwidth and barely moved: 54.5 to 67.8 tok/s since the M1 Max. Compute, which sets how fast prompts are read, grew 3.3×. Indexed to the M1 Max; speeds on Qwen3.6 35B A3B, same 64 GB.

All 1168 models on the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max

Featured only

Best quant that fits in 60.5 GB, ordered by llmrun Score. Fit grades how well it runs here, S best. How ranking works

LLM models compatible with MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB) — ranked by Score, recency and Fit
ModelVRAMScoreFit
LFM2 1.2B
1.2B·Q4_K_M·261.7 t/s·128K ctx
1.2 GBS100, Runs great
Baichuan2 13B Chat
13B·Q4_K_M·32.6 t/s
11.5 GBA72, Runs well
Human Like LLama3 8B Instruct
8.0B·Q4_K_M·51.9 t/s·8K ctx
6.2 GBA81, Runs well
Dolphin 2.9 Llama3 8B
8.0B·Q4_K_M·51.9 t/s·8K ctx
6.2 GBA81, Runs well
Qwen2.5 72B Instruct
72.7B·Q4_K_M·6.3 t/s·33K ctx
49.3 GBC42, Usable
Tiny Qwen2ForCausalLM 2.5
2M·Q4_K_M·933.3 t/s·33K ctx
0.6 GBS100, Runs great
Polyglot Ko 1.3B
1.4B·Q4_K_M·294.7 t/s·2K ctx
0.9 GBS100, Runs great
Mistral 7B v0.2
7.2B·Q4_K_M·57.0 t/s·33K ctx
6.8 GBA82, Runs well
Llama 3.1 8B
8.0B·Q4_K_M·52.8 t/s
7.9 GBA81, Runs well
Llama3 OpenBioLLM 8B
8B·Q4_K_M·52.1 t/s·8K ctx
6.2 GBA81, Runs well
DeepSeek R1 Distill Llama 8B
8.0B·Q4_K_M·51.9 t/s·131K ctx
7.3 GBA81, Runs well
Nemotron Orchestrator 8B
8.2B·Q4_K_M·50.7 t/s·41K ctx
7.6 GBA80, Runs well
Text2cypher Gemma 2 9B IT Finetuned 2024v1
9B·Q4_K_M·47.1 t/s
8.6 GBA78, Runs well
Zephyr 7B Beta
7.2B·Q4_K_M·57.0 t/s·33K ctx
6.8 GBA82, Runs well
CodeLlama 70B Instruct HF
69.0B·Q4_K_M·6.6 t/s·4K ctx
43.0 GBC43, Usable

MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max specs

Specs

Chip
M1 Max
CPU cores
10
GPU cores
32
Unified memory
64 GB
For models
60.5 GB (macOS keeps 3.5 GB)
Memory bandwidth
400 GB/s
FP16 (dense)
20.8 TFLOPS
Neural Engine
11 TOPS
Released
2021-10-26

MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max FAQ

How much memory is available for AI on the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB)?

About 60.5 GB of the 64 GB. macOS keeps roughly 3.5 GB for itself and other apps.

What is the largest model the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB) can run?

GPT OSS 120B (116.8B) at Q4_0 uses 59.1 GB, 98% of the available memory, and runs at about 57.0 tok/s.

Can the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB) run Qwen3.8 27B?

Yes. Qwen3.8 27B fits at Q4_K_M, using 17.9 GB of the 60.5 GB available, and it is the best model that runs well on this machine.

Can the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB) run 70B models?

Yes, but slowly: Llama 3.3 70B Instruct at Q4_K_M uses 51.3 GB and writes about 6.0 tok/s.

How long does the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max (64 GB) take to read a long prompt?

On Qwen3.8 27B, about 55 s for a 4K-token prompt and 7.3 min for a 32K-token document before the first word appears.

Is renting a GPU cheaper than buying the MacBook Pro 16" M1 Max?

An RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Max-Q Workstation Edition (96 GB) rents from $1.00/hr.

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